


They Can't Steal the Love You're Born to Find

by timeespaceandpixiedust



Category: RWBY
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, College AU, F/F, Some mild descriptions of violence, adam is an asshole, also sorta a courtroom au, childhood AU, is that a thing?, nonlinear timeline, remnant based au, there's fluff too
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-29
Updated: 2019-06-26
Packaged: 2019-12-26 07:25:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 13
Words: 101,376
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18278552
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/timeespaceandpixiedust/pseuds/timeespaceandpixiedust
Summary: “I lost everything.” Blake’s voice breaks, the end of her word vanishing in a croak.“Like what?” Yang demands, pushing on despite the fact that she wants to drop everything. The past pieces of herself—of them—are already on the floor at their feet. There are fragments and shards cluttered beneath them and Yang is done with attempting to find enough glue to hold herself together. “What have you possibly lost, Blake?”“I lost my home.” You. “I lost my happiness.” You. “I lost the only person I’ve ever loved.”





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hello and welcome to my spiral into bumbleby fic writing. Suffice to say what was originally intended to be a oneshot got a little out of hand. I have had the best time writing this, though, so I hope some of you enjoy reading it as well. Lots of angst so be forewarned. However, I solemnly swear this will only have a happy ending (and fluff along the way). Also warning for some mild violence/mentions of throughout. I will give warnings before specific chapters. Nothing horribly graphic, but just want to cover my bases. Some of this fic takes place in a courtroom so another warning for just the overall experience of facing against someone in court. Timeline is all over the fucking place just like my POVs. I indicate the age before each shift and though there's a few months between Blake's and Yang's birthdays I decided to just go with Yang's because she's a summer baby and that makes things real simple.

_24_

 

Vale is a big place. The island of Patch less so.

 

Coming back had been a long time coming, at least that was what Blake’s parents kept saying. She felt like this day had descended upon her with a crash, leaving a crater behind in her half-formed repairs of life. It was delayed multiple times; the inevitable pushed back another few weeks, a couple months. Every time Sun talked to her with a voice of pity, commenting about how she must want to put this away for good.

 

And she does. But she’d also happily let it loom in the distance of some far-off future a little longer. For a while, it had felt like she could keep walking down the same path and never run into the mirage at the end—an oasis or sinking quicksand that would never come to be. But now it’s two years later, and here she is.

 

Stepping off the air ship, Blake pulls her jacket a little tighter. The atmosphere was cold and brisk, dryer than the air of Menagerie or Vacuo (but warmer than Atlas, at least). She wasn’t one to embrace the cold, and she’d spent enough winters in Vale to know this was possibly the worst time to fly in.

 

She’d come with a single carry-on bag, precisely the things she would need while she was here, what she was here for. Nothing more.

 

Sun and Neptune are waiting out front, the engine of their little red Miata idling in the pickup zone, music loud enough for her to hear before swinging open the backseat. “Hey,” she says in greeting, pulling her seatbelt on.

 

Neptune turns the music down as Sun angles around from the driver’s seat to flash Blake a wide smile. “Well hey there!” he says with a little too much vigor. “Miss me?”

 

“As if,” she answers, not enticed by the concept of visiting the list of things she missed. “Thanks for letting me crash with you guys. You know, again.”

 

“Anytime,” Neptune shrugs it off before Sun can. They were well aware of why she was here. It was no secret how much she didn’t want to be. “Whatever we can do to help.”

 

It was a little too late for that. The damage had already been done, the destruction created, fossilized by Blake herself the day she decided to run in the other direction. “I just want this to be over,” she admits quietly, watching out the window so she wouldn’t have to acknowledge the sad eyes in the rearview mirror or the look Sun and Neptune would exchange with each other.

 

The blinker clicks as Sun waits in the turning lane, twisting in his seat to make eye contact. “I get it,” he says, holding her gaze, so she knows he’s being honest, that he’s well past connecting what’s happened and where it has led her and how miserable she is that it hasn’t been enough to truly take her away. Permanently. “Have you talked to-”

 

“No.”

 

He turns back around when Neptune tells him the light is green.

 

Blake watches out the window as the landscape flies by and wishes she didn’t recognize a single thing. She remembers it all. Remembering hurts worse than she’d expected. She closes her eyes and pretends to sleep, blocking out visions and memories and the past.

 

Patch was a small place. She’d just landed here for the first time in over two years. And she was fucking ready to get out.

 

\--

 

_7_

 

The beginning seems like a whole other lifetime.

 

It’s the third day of second grade. Yang’s bored already, like always. In the past, Blake had been in separate classes, different lunch periods and recesses. This year the two of them are both in Ms. Himmel’s class. Yang sits at the front. Blake is all the way in the back based on arbitrary alphabetical laws.

 

Yang’s awareness of Blake Belladonna always existed. She wasn’t big or loud or anything obvious, and that was what Yang liked about her.

 

It’s recess, the sun shining down on seven-year-olds who could care less, sprinting with abandon, sweat dripping down their backs.

 

Yang’s amidst a game of tag when something catches her eye. Her feet stall, skidding to a halt. “It” tags her, proclaiming the responsibility as being passed on. Yang waves him on, rejects his tag. He goes with it, unsure of what else to do.

 

The boys are bigger than the rest of them. They looked like they belonged in the fourth grade, like they definitely did not belong here. One of them pushes Blake’s shoulder while the rest laugh. Another grabs at one of her cat ears, cooing, “Here kitty, kitty,” in mocking tones.

 

“Get _off_ of me!” Blake shouts, eyebrows drawn in with irritation, ears folding against her head. She raises her arms but doesn’t swing, doesn’t fight back with her hands, just covers her head to try and keep them away.

 

“Back off!” Yang shouts when another one begins mussing her hair, pretending to pet her while putting on way too much pressure. “She said get off of her!” she shouts louder, feet stomping up tufts of dirt, the ground seeming to shake beneath her. Later, Blake would tell Yang she’d never seen eyes that red, never seen someone look as if they were on fire until that moment.

 

The boys stop for a second, stunted in their tracks at the ballsy seven-year-old storming over to them, looking like the devil himself is bursting free from her very soul.

 

All at once they come unstuck, laughing at her, pointing fingers. The biggest one, the one who’d been grabbing Blake’s ears, reaches out to push a hand against Yang’s chest. She slides to the side, causing him to falter. Her fist is already pulled back when he starts to fall forward. She slugs him right across the face for good measure.

 

Her dad shows up two hours later. Yang’s been sitting in the principal’s office, feet swinging as every adult in the room glared at her. They make her sit in the hall when he gets there.

 

Yang’s never been afraid of her dad. This time is no different.

 

As soon as he walks out of the office, he guides her down the hallway, stoic and silent. Silence was often their thing; she wasn’t stressed.

 

“What happened today on the playground,” her dad starts the second they walk out the front door of the school, sun hot and unrelenting on them as they stood at the top of the steps. “I want you to know, Yang Xiao Long, if anything like this _ever_ happens again” he commands, barking out her full name in an unusual display of authority. He kneels in front of her, grasping her shoulders. “I want you to do the same exact thing.”

 

Her lips quirk up for a second. She already knew she had done the right thing. It didn’t hurt to have someone agree with her, though.

 

//

 

Blake despised sitting in the back of the classroom. She was right smack dab in between Andrew and Charlie. They weren’t as mean as the other kids, they kept their hands to themselves, but they would say things, cough nasty words in her direction, laugh when her ears would fold themselves down as she stared at her desk. Blake muttered back her own insults, fought against the irritation rising inside of her, the need to _do_ something that would ultimately just land her in trouble.

 

The Monday Yang comes back from her suspension; Blake can’t exactly ignore her. She walks up towards Yang’s desk on their way out to lunch, opening her mouth with her rehearsed rush of gratitude ready to fall past her lips. She’s taking a deep breath in when she sees Yang up at the teacher’s desk, hands on her hips.

 

“It isn’t right to force us into assigned seating based exclusively on names alone,” she argues, breaking out four syllable words like it’s nothing. “Your restrictions are...restricting some your student’s abilities to learn.”

 

Ms. Himmel sighs. “Yang, the rules are the rules. I’m sorry, but everyone has to follow them. Even you.”

 

She says the last part like Yang was notorious for getting into trouble, like Blake shouldn’t have been surprised that she was punching kids in the nose to defend her honor.

 

“It’s not fair!” Yang declares, the frustration growing in her voice, her arms dropping from her hips to an indignant punch to the air beneath her, fists clenched tight. “You can’t learn if you spend the whole time worrying.”

 

Yang’s shoulders drop, her voice losing decibels, the air that had been gathering an electrical current starting to settle.

 

Blake slips out the classroom door before the conversation is finished, weighed down with the sudden understanding that Yang Xiao Long might have been talking about Blake, but that she was no stranger to worry herself.

 

//

 

Blake’s desk was situated next to Yang’s for the rest of the year. None of the other kids mess with Blake, not even the older ones. It might be a fear that Yang puts into them all, or maybe they just got the memo that she wasn’t a target, not for them to aim their poorly crafted insults at.

 

They become friends faster than lightning strikes the earth, a bond forming long before the thunder can roar.

 

Yang was silly, loud, too smart for her own good.

 

Blake was quiet, observant, taking the world in instead of putting herself out.

 

Yang tells jokes that aren’t very good, and Blake laughs at them anyway. Blake mutters comments that are meant to be just for herself, but Yang gasps out hearty chuckles for each one.

 

Blake tells her mom about her new friend. Soon, maybe it’s a month or a week or a few days, but soon Yang is her best friend, nothing new about it.

 

They tell each other the truth. There’s nothing truer than the perceptions of seven-year-olds. Yang is too young to know which cards she wants to keep close to her chest. Blake hasn’t figured out how to cement her brick walls in just right.

 

They’re seven years old, and they’re both relatively certain the world turns for the two of them, for them to be together, to be the best of friends in the world.

 

\--

 

_24_

 

There’s no doubt that Qrow knows exactly why Yang has a set to her shoulders today, why her eyes are hard-worn and even her posture exhausted. Thankfully, he also knows the one true remedy.

 

She’s barely settled herself on the cracked, red vinyl barstool and there’s already a glass of scotch in front of her, ringing out as her metal hand wraps around it. She draws back a heavy drink, wincing against the burn as she forces it down. If only it could burn her alive, fill her with smoke and flames, blocking out all other input, withholding any additional output. She could be a wildfire uncontained, destroying things in her path, sucking up the oxygen around her to keep herself moving forward.

 

Instead, Yang is a barely glowing ember, weak and flickering, no room to grow, nothing to keep it alive.

 

She throws her head back as she drains the rest of the liquid from her glass, slamming the cup down on the counter and shooting her uncle a challenging look. Just try and refuse her right now.

 

The liquid sloshes in the glass, pitch rising as the cup fills.

 

“You look like hell,” he says, taking a drink of his own—smaller, more controlled.

 

Yang grunts. She was too sober to talk; the reality was omnipresent. There was no escaping the fate that had been awaiting her for too damn long.

 

“Have you seen her yet?” he asks, topping her glass off before it’s even empty this time to keep her from throwing it at him, surely.

 

“No,” Yang answers. Maybe seeing her would be better than this bitter anticipation. Maybe it wouldn’t swallow her alive, sucking the last few ounces of life from her bloodstream, draining the strength from her muscles, the resistance in her bones. “Trial doesn’t start for another day.”

 

Qrow shoots her a look. “Don’t you have to prep for that sort of thing?”

 

“I have.” _Separately_ , she had told Weiss _. We will prepare in our own time, in different locations._ There’d been protests, arguments, rationalizations. In the end, she won. No one could fight her too hard after all.

 

He raises his eyebrows, unimpressed but silent. He leans back against the counter behind him, one arm crossing over his chest, the other clutching his glass, ice cubes clinking. “Think you’re still in love with her?”

 

“Maybe I never was in love with her.”

 

He scoffs. “Yang,” he says her name like he’s begging her, that she won’t make him play this game of half-truths and full lies. “I was there, kid.”

 

“That’s exactly what I was,” she bites back, she can feel the anger burning beneath the surface, the crackling of glowing embers fighting back to life within her bloodstream. “I was just a kid.”

 

“A kid in love, sure.”

 

\--

 

_12_

 

It was Yang’s twelfth birthday. Qrow was like, ten minutes late when he showed up, hauling his gift out of the back of his truck and dragging it towards the front door.

 

There are no extra cars here, no signs that there’s any sort of party going on.

 

The front door is cracked open. Qrow walks through. Ruby’s on the couch, feet tucked underneath her as she reads a book. Yang and Tai are going at it like none other in the background.

 

“We’ve had plans, Yang. We’ll go over after.” Tai’s voice is heavy, like he’s said these words before, like this conversation has already happened.

 

“No!” Yang shouts, fierce and angry. “Call them. Tell them not to come. It’s not what I want.”

 

Ruby looks up at him, shakes her head. “Blake’s in the hospital,” is the explanation she gives him. That’s really all any of them need.

 

“We have to go!” Yang cries, she’s pissed and argumentative, but Qrow can tell she’s on the verge of crying. “You’re ruining everything!”

 

Alright, time to intervene. “Whoa,” he says, dropping the box to the floor. “What’s going on here?”

 

Tai looks like he’s been through the wringer like he hasn’t slept or eaten or looked in a mirror for about a week.

 

Yang’s halfway between irate and devastated, eyes a shade of pink, blood boiling beneath the surface, but not all the way there, not quite to the extent of full-blown enragement. “Blake had to have surgery. I need to go to the hospital.”

 

“We have twenty kids showing up in the next half hour,” her dad sighs.

 

“What the hell, am I doing here already?” Qrow looks at the watch on his wrist. “And fifteen minutes late on top of it.”

 

“They lied to you about the time!” Ruby chirps from the living room.

 

Of course. “Give me some numbers,” Qrow says, extending his hand.

 

Tai stares back at him like he’s lost his mind, reaching for his wallet.

 

“No, dumbass,” he barks, Ruby giggles from the other room. “I’ll help you call some of these snot-nosed nightmares and tell them not to come. Party’s off.”

 

“But-” Tai starts to argue, looking from Qrow to Yang to the clock on the wall.

 

“C’mon,” Qrow says, fixing his friend with a look, feeling Yang’s eyes wide and staring at him. “You think this kid is gonna enjoy one minute of her party if Blake isn’t here? What’s the point of making her even more miserable on her birthday?”

 

Twenty minutes later and they’re walking through the door of a hospital room covered in bright, neon paint colors with a sun painted on the ceiling. Blake looks like goddamn Wednesday Adams lying in bed surrounded by it all as if she’d been swallowed alive by the masquerade of happiness and trapped in a bed too big to escape from.

 

The minute she sees Yang, it’s a whole different story. Her face cracks open wide, happiness finding its way into her chest and shining from the inside out.

 

Yang’s at her side, immediately looking at Blake’s stomach, the tiny marks from the surgery, little pieces of gauze with dark, dried blood on them sitting overtop.

 

They’re both talking in hushed, rapid voices. Blake’s parents come over to Tai and Qrow, taking Ruby’s launch into their arms like it’s nothing. “What about her party?” her mom asks, looking over at Yang who had already weaseled her way into Blake’s bed, an arm around her shoulders.

 

“I tried,” Tai said, shaking his head.

 

It’s impossible to miss the gentleness between them, how Yang watches Blake with concern in her eyes, taking inventory of every part of her until assuring she was okay. Blake says she’s sorry, voice sad and wet. Yang’s answer is too quiet for him to hear. Qrow doesn’t really feel like he needs to.

 

“As if she would’ve been happier anywhere else.”

 

//

 

Qrow gets tasked with going to the grocery store and buying popsicles because they’re a clear liquid and allowed for Blake’s post-surgical diet.

 

He also, per Ruby’s insistence, buys a pack of candles though the deduction of how they were going to fit one into a popsicle had not yet been concluded.

 

Yang’s reading when he gets back, Blake’s head on her shoulder, eyes half open, body fit against Yang’s.

 

Ruby doesn’t hesitate to kick off her shoes and climb on to the foot of the bed, crossing her legs beneath her and propping her head in her hands. Yang offers her a smile, eyes gentle, tone warm. His niece was a stick of dynamite waiting to explode; there was a fire of ferocity burning in her capillaries, a desperate devastation of abandonment lodged behind her eyes, a rippling rage of loneliness circulating through her lymph.

 

Right then, she’s a malleable blend of steadfast and ever-changing, a pliable combination of strength and gentleness, carrying the weight of the world on her shoulders, picking up two more people along the way.

 

In the end, they all fall asleep, the popsicles melt into a gooey mess, and no one kicks them out long after visiting hours have ended.

 

\--

 

_24_

 

Two days from the first trial date and Blake is over meeting with this lawyer Weiss had mustered up for them. He kept telling her how to answer questions, when not to say anything at all, how to sit.

 

She knows he’s right. She tries to listen.

 

The process is grating on her nerves, turning her into a tense ball of frustration and biting comments beneath her breath. It doesn’t help that she’s alone. Not that she necessarily expected anything else, not that there was ever another option, but apart of her wondered if maybe she would benefit from at least _seeing_ Yang before they’re sitting in a courtroom, on the same side but a million miles apart.

 

The one good thing about being back in Patch is the fact that Blake’s favorite coffee shop is still open, still has her chosen blend of tea, her preferred quiet atmosphere.

 

She goes almost every day after her prep classes, sits amongst gentle guitar strings and soothing tones pouring from the speakers, sipping a hot cup of tea wrapped in her hands as she watches the room around her, the people walking by out on the street. The slightest flash of gold gets Blake’s heart racing, tripping over itself at the possibility, the potential.

 

For watching so closely, it probably shouldn’t be much of a surprise when Ruby is standing in front of her, smiling down. Except Blake hadn’t been looking for Ruby; she wasn’t on the lookout for bright red or silver eyes or wide smiles.

 

Of course, that’s exactly what Ruby is. She looks down at Blake with a gentle curve of her lips, hands clutching a cup of hot chocolate, whipped cream piled on top.

 

It’s only been two years. Not much happens in two years, especially from ages 20-22, but Blake finds herself taking inventory, documenting the changes, heart squeezing at the fact that she’s missed them taking place. “Hey, Blake,” Ruby says quietly causing Blake’s gaze to shoot straight up into Ruby’s eyes. They haven’t changed a bit since she was a scrappy little kindergartner.

 

“Ruby,” Blake responds and just saying her name makes an ache awaken in her chest—like it knows who is always close to Ruby and it’s ready to find her, go to her. “How are you?”

 

Perching on the armchair beside Blake, Ruby rests the bottom of her mug on her knee, freeing up a hand as she shrugs. “Good,” she says, eyes on Blake, then the floor, then back to Blake. “I’ve missed you.”

 

Ruby would be the one to say those words. She’d be the one to mean them. “Same,” Blake answers but her heart pounds in her chest, declaring her a liar. You don’t run from the people you miss, it seems to say. You try and hold onto them. Blake had been far too busy pushing away.

 

Surprisingly, Ruby doesn’t get up and leave. She settles into her seat, back resting against it, eyes wandering the room with Blake now. “How long have you been back?”

 

“Couple days,” Blake says, not wanting to admit that she’d been here and hadn’t tried to contact a single person. She slept in Sun’s living room and ate his food and tried to pretend this was closer to ending than beginning.

 

“Are you ready for-”

 

“No.” She sighs, stopping the question before it can form, before she can be reminded of what’s to come. They sit in silence from there, music bleeding from one song to the next, drinks going lukewarm, the hope of a flash of yellow never quite being realized. “How is she?” Blake blurts out when she can’t take it any longer. Their drinks are gone, the people in the shop are beginning to dissipate, the ending naturally closing in.

 

The question was hard enough to get out. Ruby doesn’t make it any easier with her sympathetic eyes that flash hard, for just a second. Is there anyone who could ever even find the start line for the marathon of forgiveness Blake would require, would anyone have even the slightest inclination to try?

 

“You know Yang,” Ruby answers and Blake’s whole body reacts to her name. Her blood sings and her muscles strain, her cells reaching towards something that was too far away to see, let alone grab. “She won’t let anyone in on the fact if she’s anything less than fine.”

 

Anyone but you.

 

No one says it. They both know the other is thinking it.

 

\--

 

_8_

 

The first time Yang gets invited over for a sleepover at Blake’s she makes the mistake of asking if she can bring Ruby.

 

They’re eight years old now, entering into the third grade after a summer of biking to each other’s houses, watching movies on Yang’s old TV, and jumping in the backyard with Blake’s sprinkler dousing them both.

 

“Sure,” Blake says but her eyebrows go all funny, her head turning to look at Yang. “I mean if you want her to come.”

 

“I do,” Yang reassures.

 

When she gets home, she packs Ruby’s bag, explains what they’re doing this weekend. Ruby adores Blake; she hops from one foot to the next in excitement.

 

Saturday afternoon their dad drops them off, hugging them both briefly before letting them dash to the door. Yang knocks, and the only reason she waits to go inside is because her dad is watching them.

 

It isn’t until bedtime that the trouble starts. Blake’s mom is digging through Ruby’s bag for her toothbrush. Yang knows she must have forgotten it.

 

“Your house is barely a mile away,” Mrs. Belladonna smiles kindly. “You and I will just go take a little road trip to pick it up, Ms. Ruby.”

 

Yang panics. “It’s okay,” she insists at the same time Ruby goes, “But how would we get inside?” turning her little head to the side in confusion.

 

“Nonsense,” the concern is dismissed away. “We’ll just call your dad to unlock the door.”

 

Yang has a lie prepped, something about her dad going to bed early, never keeping his scroll on him, a whole anecdote and antics that have resulted because of it.

 

Ruby beats her to the punchline. “But it’s Saturday,” she says, and Yang feels all the blood rush from her head, right into the dread that was awakening in the pit of her stomach. “Daddy’s not home tonight.”

 

Mrs. Belladonna looks down at Ruby with parted lips and wide eyes before looking past Ruby’s shoulder towards Yang. Whatever expression Yang’s wearing at the moment is enough to make her drop it. “Okay, sweetie, we’ll improvise on the teeth brushing.”

 

From then on, every single Saturday was sleepover night.

 

\--

 

_10_

 

“So you mean your mom just left you?” Blake whispers in the dark. They’re on their sides in Blake’s twin bed, facing each other, Ruby passed out on the floor. “And you don’t know why?”

 

“My dad won’t tell me,” Yang says. She’s already begun to conclude the fact that he just might not know.

 

The silence holds the confession, gives Blake a chance to process, gives Yang a minute to collect herself. “And you have no idea where she is?”

 

_Not with me,_ Yang bites back. _What else matters?_ “No.”

 

Blake’s hand reaches out, pushes some of Yang’s wild, blonde hair behind her ear. “I’m sorry,” she whispers so not even the walls or furniture or air itself could steal an ounce of those words from her. They are murmured just for Yang to hold onto.

 

“Me too,” she admits, even though she doesn’t want to, even though she would rather deny that it hurts at all. It hurts worse than when she broke her leg, worse than when Ruby shouted she hated her, worse than the teachers at school accusing her of cheating for getting a perfect score on her math test.

 

Blake pretends like she doesn’t notice Yang is crying, just runs her hand along her back and lets her fall asleep cradled against her chest. An anger stirs in Blake’s stomach, travels to her beneath her ribs. How could anyone dare to break her best friend this way, that Yang who stood with strength and determination and a fierce protective nature had been let down so completely?

 

First, it makes Blake angry, makes her want to scream and shout in the face of whoever Yang’s birth mom is, declare how foolish she was for missing out on her daughter. It fades into sadness, one that makes her pull her friend a little closer and wish to promise she’d never leave, wouldn’t dare miss out.

 

_I will love you enough to fill in the cracks,_ Blake thinks with her face buried in Yang’s hair. There’s a promise someone needs to make, one that someone needs to keep far more. They’re children, but Blake knows more than anyone gives her credit for. She was loud in a different way, fought with words and determination instead of fists. She would fight for Yang. No one was going to stop her; they’d better not even try.

 

\--  


_11_

 

It wasn’t unheard of for Blake’s parents to argue, but they normally refrained when Yang was over.

 

Tonight—that isn’t the case. They’re yelling like they mean it, the words not hushed or monitored. Blake rarely heard her mother cursing. So far tonight she’s dropped the f-bomb three times.

 

“So,” Yang says, back against the headboard of Blake’s bed, legs crossed in front of her. “This is what it’s like having two parents, huh?”

 

Blake cracks a smile, scrambles onto the bed beside Yang. “They’ve been like this a lot recently,” she sighs, laying her head on the pillow and looking up at Yang. “Dad’s been getting more involved with this pro-Faunus group called the White Fang. Their headquarters are far away, though. They want him to come out and visit.”

 

“How far away?” Yang asks, shifting so she laid beside Blake, eyes soft and a gentle smile. “If you guys take some epic vacation, you better get me a good souvenir.”

 

Blake doesn’t breathe a word about how her dad wasn’t always just suggesting a vacation. She doesn’t bring up the past fights she’s heard, some of them with her ear pressed against the door as they argued in whispers and hurried tones. The very memory makes her stomach sink, her hands twist. “Menagerie,” Blake answers the question, not wanting to imagine what an island so far would be like to live on. “And forget the souvenir. If they’re making me travel to some lame island, I’m bringing you with me.”

 

Of course, Yang breaks into a smile. It’s no surprise that her eyes sparkle in the overhead light. “I like the way you think,” she says, flipping to her back and staring at the ceiling. Kali curses again.

 

“Maybe we should’ve stayed at your place tonight…” Blake trails off, eyes flicking to the door and back.

 

Yang just shrugs a shoulder, eyes slipping shut as her body relaxes into the mattress beneath her. “Doesn’t matter,” she answers, giving Blake’s hand a tug and dragging her over to lay against her. “You’re here.”

 

_For now,_ Blake thinks, fighting back tears before they can force their way free. “Yeah,” she whispers in agreement, stuck on thinking about things unsaid, on a fear that hasn’t laid dormant since her dad had first breathed the possibility to life. “All we need is each other.”

 

“Now you’re getting it, Blake.”

 

\--

 

_14_

 

“Do you miss her?” a twelve-year-old Ruby asks, pressed against Yang’s side, the moonlight streaming through the curtains just enough that a sliver of her face is visible.

 

It’s been a year. Missing someone shouldn’t still be so raw after so long, especially when you’ve lived so little. “Like I’d miss a limb,” Yang confesses to the darkness, letting her little sister run a hand along the top of her head.

 

Yang didn’t really like people touching her hair. People aside from Ruby, that is. Ruby and Blake.

 

\--

 

_24_

 

The courtroom is quietly uneasy. People are murmuring, chairs creaking beneath shifting weight, a hushed anxiety hanging in the air.

 

Tai’s talking to Yang, hand on her shoulder—saying something about her posture or her hair or avoiding sarcasm - it doesn’t matter. That’s the moment Blake walks in, stepping through the door with her head down, arm crossed over her chest, grasping onto her elbows with force. She’s in a deep purple top that ties in the front, satin strings hanging down. Her skirt falls just above her knees, straight and simple, very business casual, and she’s got heels on giving her that slight advantage to her height that she’d always been going on about.

 

Blake’s hair is pulled back at the sides, exposing her face, her ears flattened against her head as she looks around the room. Yang wouldn’t be surprised if their lawyer suggested the hairstyle. He’d been all about “using their angles” and “taking advantage of their youth.” Sounded like a bunch of meek, mild women bullshit if someone were to ask Yang, but whatever.

 

At some point, her dad must recognize the fact that his daughter is not registering a single word he’s saying. His gaze follows where hers is fixated, and he stops talking altogether.

 

She’s beautiful, and Yang desperately wishes she could think anything else. Right now, the thought is so consuming it’s all she has the headspace for.

 

Blake must feel eyes on her, or maybe she just knows exactly where Yang is in the room. She can feel Yang’s presence swallowing them whole, can perceive the draw she has to that exact spot in the room, just like it takes Yang every ounce of her will to fight against the magnetic pull calling to her from where Blake stands.

 

Their eyes meet and now breathing, moving, speaking, those concepts have had to vacate Yang’s mind to make any semblance of capacity for the sort of attention Blake demands. It’s been two years, feels like two lifetimes, should only have been two days, but she’s back to being 21. Abruptly she is in love again, the world including nothing but her and Blake and what they had together. The rest no longer matters. There’s no fighting a love like that, no ignoring the-

 

“Did you really have to wear that?” Weiss demands with arms crossed over her chest, taking over Yang’s vision.

 

Right, she breathes out, this is what life is now. A life without Blake; a life _she_ has agency over, no one else. “Yep.”

 

“Wearing blue is supposed to generate sympathy. I told you this,” Weiss says from within her own blue dress, hand on her hip.

 

Yang holds up her arm, lets it bend at the hinge and attempts to make it look flaccid, truly mechanical. “Got all my sympathy stored right up in her,” she says, hitting it with her left hand so it moves in an empty, swinging motion. “Anything more just would’ve been cruel,” she says with a shrug. “Not to mention, blue just really isn’t my color.”

 

Without looking, without seeing Weiss’ face, without any other knowledge but the shift in the currency of the air around her, Yang knows Blake is behind her, can feel the exact distance between them now. If she took two steps back, she could reach out her hand and find Blake’s.

 

The fact that Blake’s behind her allows Yang a moment to collect herself, eyes falling shut as she inhales purposefully, the air rushing from her lungs as she turns to face Blake. Just to be a dick, she holds out her right hand for Blake to shake, as if handshakes were any sort of greeting between the two of them.

 

Blake’s eyes hold Yang’s extended offering for a moment longer than appropriate before she moves to shake her hand, grip feeble enough that Yang could easily shake her off—if she chose to. A part of her thinks about trying.

 

It’s a small victory, forcing Blake to hold a piece of Yang while Yang gets to feel nothing beside the shift in movement of her upper arm. She can remain untouched; Blake will always have a new memory formed with Yang now, a new spot to remember her touch, as if they hadn’t already memorized every bit of the other.

 

“Let’s get this over with, yeah?” Yang asks, fighting against the question in Blake’s eyes, the desperation. She pushes straight through to casual, maybe even slightly callous. It was the only way they would ever get close to surviving.

 

Yang’s already pretty sure they won’t. When she drops her metal arm, she leaves her heart behind in Blake’s palm. It’s been longing to return for far too long now.


	2. Chapter 2

_ 13 _

 

“What do you mean you’re moving?” Yang demands, arms crossing over her chest, eyes shifting from gentle violet to violent red. “Where would you go?”  _ Why would you leave me? _

 

A plan had been crafted for telling Yang. Ground-rule number one: No crying. “My parents...they want to join the White Fang. They want to try and fight for a better life for Faunus everywhere.  _ I  _ want to fight.”

 

Yang’s eyebrows gather together in the center of her forehead.  _ I’ll protect you _ ; Blake can sense the words even when they aren’t said.  _ I will make sure your life is the best possible.  _

 

“It’s worse other places,” Blake rushes to say, using the same argument her parents had laid into her. “In Atlas there are rumors Faunus are still being used as slaves, Yang. We can’t just...we can’t do nothing.”

 

Yang’s lips part, no words spilling out. In their five years of friendship, Yang was rarely quiet, hardly ever without words. Now she has nothing but an open, gaping mouth that a sob escapes from. Blake hugs her immediately, devastated to be causing this pain in the person she loves most in the world, crushed in knowing there was no way to make it better.

 

“You wouldn’t be doing nothing,” Yang finally says, hours later when she’s calmed. No more sobs, no more tears, no more loud, angry denials. Her words are soft, to the point that Blake wonders if Yang thinks she’s dozed off—if the words aren’t actually meant for anyone but Yang herself. “You would be staying with me.”

 

Blake splinters apart into a million, shattered pieces of disappointment.

 

//

 

At first, they text constantly. Text messages all day supplemented with calls, emails, and video chats the rest of the time. Blake’s never been a great photographer, but she documents every inch of Menagerie, wanting Yang to see where she lived, give her the ability to imagine Blake here. She was living a life only half worth it, not able to fully be met until Yang was at her side again.

 

They discuss Yang visiting in the summer two weeks after Blake moves there. It’s barely even September, and she’s talking her parents’ ears off about their plans for June. She does odd jobs, saving up money to help pay to fly Yang to her. 

 

Eventually, she gets pulled into the work. Her parents had wanted to get her involved while helping her remain separate. It made her feel like a child, but she went with it, mostly at least. She fought first, argued that she wasn’t a little kid, that she could  _ do  _ something. She was sick of being seen as small or weak. She was ready to be more.

 

One day, after a general meeting, one where there were heated debates, people throwing out words like just and fair and revenge—her parents are amid of a heated conversation with the leader, Sienna. Blake’s just pulled out her scroll to text Yang when a presence intrudes her space, demands attention without her ever physically seeing him.

 

When she looks up, there’s Adam Taurus. She knew of him more than knew him personally. He was older, graduated from high school and gaining popularity as one of the more prominent members of the movement.

 

He was nice to her, asked her questions, told her things in those few minutes that her parents had never offered information on before. She was hanging on his words when her mom called out her name. Adam slipped a piece of paper into her hand with his number scribbled on it. “If you have any questions,” he whispers, teeth showing in a smile. 

 

She’s unsettled and fascinated all at once.

 

Over the next month, Yang notices the shift. Asks Blake constantly what’s going on, is everything okay, why aren’t you acting like yourself.

 

One night Blake’s with Adam, it was a whole group gathering, but they were off to the side. He was giving out information, knowledge; he trusted her even though she was young, he said. She was responsible, smart, dependable. He knew he could count on her, right? She was mature for her age, smarter than the rest.

 

When her scroll rings, he gets angry, disappointment flaring in a grimace and frustration rolling off his tense muscles. Blake hits ignore immediately.

 

The next time it happens is a week later. His reaction is the same, even a little worse. She texts Yang and asks her not to call anymore, says that she will be the one to call when she’s free. The whole message is enough to tear off a piece of her soul as she sends it. Worse still is the lie, blaming her parents for the drop in contact, stating they wanted her more involved.

 

In fact, it was the opposite. Her mom eyes her, asks if she’s sleeping and if she was doing okay in school. So many questions, so many people treating her like a child. 

 

Adam understands. He listens to her and says the right things in response. He’s in her head; she seems to be in his. Blake doesn’t think too hard about what that means, just lets herself feel the rush of happiness, the joy of acceptance, every time he beams and tells her she’s done something right.

 

They were here for a cause, for a purpose. Blake swears not to lose the vision, not to forget the kids who tormented her, who only stopped because Yang scared them. Blake was over someone else being the one who protected her. She was damn ready to protect herself.

 

\--

 

_ 24 _

 

Yang gets called up to the witness stand first. 

 

It’s after several hours of the prosecution and defendant presenting their cases, laying out why they’re all here in this shoebox of a room in the first place. 

 

Yang walks to the front with steady steps, her eyes avoiding the right side of the room as soon as she turns around. He’s there, obviously. She can see bright orange and dark red in her peripheral, but she refuses to offer him a full glance in his direction, refuses to give him the satisfaction of seeing how his presence shakes her. She shoves her trembling left hand under her thigh as soon as she’s done offering her vow of honesty and truth. 

 

On the first day of preparation their lawyer, Ironwood, had prepared her for the questions he was going to start with, the answers he wanted her to offer back. 

 

In the seats in front of her are her sister and Weiss, a small smile shot her way from Ruby and Weiss the picture of anxiety. Behind them are her dad and her uncle, both looking at her like she could be getting ready to send a man to jail or graduate from college all over again with the pride they hold in their eyes. 

 

There’s Blake beside Ironwood, of course, and she looks at Yang, offering a nod, like that could mean anything. Further back sit Blake’s parents and behind them are people Yang only barely recognizes, the blue-haired kid was Neptune and the swishing tail belonged to Sun. The people Blake ran to when she was running away. Maybe one of them is her boyfriend now. He would treat her well, with kindness and love and-

 

“Miss Xiao Long,” Ironwood says in a stern tone, gathering her attention as she quickly becomes aware of the fact that she’d missed his original question.

 

“Yes? Sorry.”

 

“Please state your first and last name.”

 

Right, when they’d practiced this the other day Yang had drawled a, “Really?” and rolled her eyes. “Yang Xiao Long.” Maybe they should’ve rehearsed a second time after all.

 

“Thank you,” he glares for a second, reminding her to keep her head on her shoulders. “In your own words, can you tell the people why you are here today.”

 

Yang swallows, looking down at her hands, the left shaking, the cooling metal of her right grasping it in an attempt to still the tremors. “To aid in the rightful prosecution of Adam Taurus.”

 

“Objection,” the defendant cuts in. “Misleading answer.”

 

“Sustained,” the judge says, waving a hand for them to continue.

 

“Why are you here?” Ironwood asks again, voice uncharacteristically soft.

 

Yang stares right past the look he attempts to burrow into her soul; her eyes drifting over to Blake who watches Yang with her lips pressed together, eyes heavy like the weight of the world is the only thing holding back tears right now.

 

Yang decides against answering with,  _ Because I have to be. _

 

\--

 

_ 12 _

 

“You can’t just decide someone is your soulmate,” Blake argues in the backyard. Yang rests in the sun, letting the beams wash over her skin, too young to care about sunburn or skin damage or freckles when it’s the first warm day in months and months. 

 

“Sure you can,” Yang sighs, eyes falling shut. She wasn’t one for deep breathing, slipping within herself, finding peace. But at this moment, with a hot sun grazing along her skin and Blake beside her, whose were hands fiddling with tiny flowers as she stuck them all along Yang’s hair, this moment was the epitome of peace. There would be no wars, no politics, no crime if everyone in the world could experience this exact moment. “I just did.”

 

Blake’s rolling her eyes. Yang knows without looking. “It’s decided by destiny,” she says. If anyone would knew logistics of soulmates, it would be Blake. She was always reading, poetry that didn’t make a lick of sense in Yang’s brain that she stopped and listened to anyway when Blake was saying the words. 

 

Humming in response Yang opens her eyes, finds Blake looking at her. She smiles up. “Well, my destiny believes in free will,” she argues, mostly for the sake of getting Blake going, dragging this discussion out properly. 

 

Blake cocks her head to the side, fixes Yang with a look before plucking another purple wildflower, tucking it between strands of hair, her fingers icy and startling as they brush against Yang’s neck. “You’re difficult.”

 

“That’s why you love me,” Yang says, sticking her tongue and pulling a face until Blake cracks, a smile taking over. 

 

“Don’t flatter yourself.”

 

They loved each other fiercely, like best friends who didn’t know they were missing a part of themselves until it came together—natural, easy. Being without Blake was like being without a part of herself, maybe even more dramatic, maybe it was like being without her heart. 

 

Yang relents, offering Blake what she wants. “If destiny is some big, ominous, uncontrollable thing, then it would have a say over who I meet, how I find whoever my soulmate is, right?”

 

Blake thinks her words over before nodding, laying on her stomach and braiding a section of Yang’s hair, tucking the flowers along the way. “Yes, that would be right.”

 

“So,” Yang says, eyes glancing to the side, taking in Blake’s fixed stare of concentration, the delicate movements of her fingers, “that would mean you could be my soulmate. Destiny was the one putting us in the same class,” she argues, facing the sky again, the sun hiding behind a cloud, so it wasn’t as blinding. “I wasn’t the one making any of that happen. I’m just calling it like I see it.”

 

Blake doesn’t answer her, just keeps braiding, fingers buried in Yang’s hair. Yang feels a little bit like Blake’s reaching right through to her heart.

 

\--

 

_ 17 _

 

June is the start of proper heat, short shorts and beach days and hair piled on top of heads the only escape from withering humidity.

 

It would make more sense to be riding her motorcycle over right now, letting the hot wind blow in her face and getting this over with. Walking seems right, though. So she sets out on foot, orange tank top catching sweat off of her back as she walks, ponytail swinging behind her.

 

She knocks on the door, not quite as familiar with the residence as she had once been. Yang’s curious how they got the same house back, but she doesn’t ask.

 

There’s a shuffling of feet before the door swings open, Ghira Belladonna overtaking the entrance. “Yang!” he says, face breaking into a smile the second he sees her. “Please, come in.” Inside is cool, air conditioning blasting, humidity eradicated. “We’ve missed you.”

 

Yang holds back any bitter comments about how they were the ones who left, who took her world with them. She was seventeen, not an asshole. “Likewise,” she says, voice a little drier than she means it, but she doesn’t shake off his hug, even though she’s sweaty and gross and doesn’t really need anyone touching her right now. 

 

“Hey,” Blake’s greeting is quiet. She shoots Yang a small smile as her dad glances her way before nodding and walking off. 

 

“Hi,” Yang says, the heat seems to have followed her inside. It shouldn’t be weird; this moment has happened a hundred times before. At one point, Yang was as much a fixture in this house as a Belladonna. Standing in their entryway wasn’t new. It felt like she had never once been here before. 

 

Blake shifts from one foot to the other, the stair squeaking under her weight. “We can go up to my room,” she says, waiting for Yang’s nod before turning in that direction.

 

Each step is decided, sure and steady. The inside of Blake’s room is even less familiar. The stick-on stars from the ceiling are gone, the posters replaced with blank wall space, the pictures of the two of them missing. It was a skeleton of a room, nothing like the space Yang had slept in every weekend for five years of her life.

 

There are boxes spread throughout, some of them bursting with half-removed items, others still taped up, a small stack of emptied ones collected in the corner. “It seems silly to unpack much,” Blake says, removing handfuls of books and setting them on her shelf. “Since we’ll be leaving for college so soon.”

 

_ We.  _ It’d been a lifetime since they had been a we. “You probably shouldn’t take the entirety of your belongings to college,” Yang quips, her voice missing its usual teasing tone, words falling flat. 

 

“Probably not.”

 

With nothing else to do, Yang pulls open a box, taking a stack of clothes and setting them in a drawer. Remembering how Blake organized her clothes was one of those things that never released her brain space back to her, no matter how long the trivia went unused. Well, how Blake used to organize her clothes, at least. Yang was going to work under the pretense that nothing had changed. 

 

“Yang, I-”

 

Yang clears her throat, effectively cutting Blake off. “Did you sign up to room with anyone in particular?”

 

The books make a heavy thump as a particularly large stack is set against the faded, black shelf in the far corner of the room. “No. You?”

 

“This girl I met during the tour. Her name is Weiss. She’s from Atlas.”

 

Blake shoots her a look. “A girl from Atlas is going to a Vale state school?”

 

“Something about sticking it to her dad,” Yang laughs, hating how much it sounds like an imitation. “She seems all prim and proper so hope she doesn’t regret asking me.” It had been so unexpected. Yang had rejoined the group that day even though her head was still out there with Blake, floating around between disbelief and fragile hope. Weiss asked if she’d share rooms with her, something about having a fear of tuba players and Yang shrugged, agreeing without totally listening. 

 

“Does she even know you?” Blake says it like a joke. Yang sees the flash in her eyes that reads,  _ do I even know you? _

 

Yang ignores the question, stacking piles of underwear in the top drawer, cute ones near the front, old, worn ones in the back. Funny how such trivial information managed not to fade. At the bottom of the box is a brace, ACE wraps, big gauze bandages. What the hell had she been doing? “Ruby keeps asking about you,” Yang blurts out, desperate for something to say.

 

There’s a flash of a smile, a hint of fondness revealed. “I’ve missed her.”

 

A sharp inhale causes Yang’s chest to expand, her eyes falling shut as she attempts to rein in her emotions. Blake is staring at her, watching her. Yang looks away. “She’s missed you too.”

 

“Yang…”

 

Don’t cry. Don’t cry. Don’t cry.

 

“What?”

 

“I’m  _ sorry _ .”

 

“Okay.”

 

There’s a sharp rush of air as Blake watches her, head turning to the side as she evaluates what Yang is saying, attempts to comprehend just how far she needs to go, how vigorous her efforts need to be to prove herself. “Okay?” she tests each syllable out, eyes blinking.

 

“Yeah,” Yang says, turning back to the box of bandages, eyes fixed on the dried blood stain of a used ACE wrap. “You’re forgiven.”

 

“But-”

 

Yang drops her head, staring at the floor, fighting back the tears filling her eyes. She looks Blake in the eye. “You can explain later,” she offers. “Just...take your forgiveness now.”

 

Blake drops her face in her hands and sobs. Heavy, broken cries.

 

Every part of Yang wants to keep to herself, refrain from giving out too much of the person she has fought to reform herself into. The missing pieces reach out reflexively, placing a hand on Blake’s shoulder. “Come on,” she urges, squeezing once before pulling her hand away. “Let’s make this room look a little more lived in.”

  
  


\--

 

_ 24 _

 

Their first recess is at almost two in the afternoon. A half an hour break is declared, sandwiches are offered in the deliberation room. Yang walks past the group of people waiting for her, past the line for deli-cuts in the hallway, past the eyes she can’t escape from and right outside.

 

This day has been approaching slowly, yet Yang had always pictured it somewhat the same. Gloomy sky, cold weather, maybe a little rain. Instead, it’s the most beautiful day Vale has seen in weeks. The blanket of cold begins to lift; the sun shines down; the snow starts to melt. 

 

Yang leans against the fountain out front of the courthouse. It’s been turned off since November now, just dried up algae plastered against the side of fading stone.

 

Sure, her dad is probably looking for her, Weiss has some sort of critique to offer, Ruby a hug and her proximity. Yang shouldn’t be out here right now, but she can’t bring herself to go back in. 

 

A part of her debates who will be the first one to approach her—the rest of her already knows the answer.

 

“You would think all those cops shows would have rubbed off on us some more,” Blake says from behind Yang, her voice getting caught in a breeze, broken up and reforming before it reaches its destination.

 

The joke might have landed better if it didn’t feel like a fucking stab to the heart. “What the hell is wrong with you?” Yang asks. She’s been playing it cool all day, living off of inconsequential moments like handshakes and not looking and refusing to let the tremors overtake her body.  _ Those  _ were her victories so far today, and Blake was really going to come out here and start talking about the past? She was going to remind Yang of weekends curled on a couch, popcorn and soda on the table in front of them, twelve and stupid and carefree. She was really going to fucking do that?

 

Someone calls them to lunch, reminding them they didn’t have much time. Yang wasn’t particularly interested in food right now. Something so small no longer matters when the fire in her veins ignites and a glacier tucked away in her chest is cracking, bursting, reaching out to familiarity.  _ I know exactly the way to heal _ , her heart, her lungs, seem to be shouting.  _ Let me go to her. _

 

Blake bites her lip, taking a step back like the verbal assault physically impacts her. “I don’t know how else to talk to you,” she admits quietly, eyes falling to the pavement before she looks back at Yang, tears welling so there’s a layer separating Yang from the golden irises she’s stared into so many times before—a wall that she can see straight through.

 

How symbolic.

 

“Here’s a thought,” Yang says, standing a little taller as she takes a step forward. She was forced to step closer in order to get away. “How about you don’t?”

 

\--

 

_ 9 _

 

“Like this?” Yang holds up a collection of too loose strings, purple and black not quite tethered together.

 

Blake offers a smile, hands gingerly taking the thread from Yang. “You need a third color,” she says, instead of saying it’s bad. Yang didn’t like being told anything she did was bad. Blake wasn’t about to challenge that.

 

“You like purple and black,” Yang says plainly, looking over the remaining options. “What other color do you want?”

 

“Surprise me,” she answers, focusing on her own bracelet for Yang. Friendship bracelets were stupid, obviously, but when Blake explained that every other girl in her fourth-grade class had one except her, like it was a taunt personally aimed in her direction, Yang had shown up with a whole kit under her arm, bike forgotten in the front yard. 

 

The craft was simplistic enough, but required time, focus, precision. Yang was a hundred and one things, none of them short of amazing, but precision wasn’t really her specialty. 

 

The fact doesn’t stop her from spending the next several hours weaving together strands of black, purple, and yellow. “A little bit of you and a little bit of me,” she says when tying it around Blake’s wrist. “Isn’t that the whole point of these dumb things anyway?”

 

Blake ties a bracelet that looks roughly the same—tighter, cleaner, but the same colors, around Yang’s wrist, smiling with satisfaction. “Thank you.”

 

“Sure,” Yang says like it doesn’t mean anything. Blake already knows she’s aware. “Here, let’s make Ruby one from us. She’ll love it.”

 

Blake wears hers proudly the next day, even when some of the strings poke out of their spot, some of the thread looser than it should be, other parts pulled too tight. It’s uneven and messy, but she wears it every day. Before fifth-grade starts, the other girls are taking theirs off, cutting them free, uncaring of symbolism.

 

The messy, stained threads stay around Blake’s wrist until she’s fourteen. Adam passes her a pair of scissors, tells her to cut the ugly thing off her arm, remove the taint of a human on her skin. She tries to shove it into her pocket once it’s removed. He snatches it from her hand, tossing it into the bonfire. He offers her congratulations on being one step closer.

 

It’s the first time Blake feels naked in front of him, like he’s sees things he shouldn’t, exposing her in ways she doesn’t want him to.

 

He walks away a minute later. She stares into the flames as the faded, dirty purple and yellow shrivel up and die.

 

\--

 

_ 18 _

 

Blake lays languidly out along the couch, arms stretching, back arching, the back of her head rolling along Yang’s thigh as she shifts position before settling once more. Her cheek presses into Yang’s skin, the scent of her body wash clogging up Blake’s olfactory system and triggering every synaptic connection there was between this distinct aroma and the memories attributed to it. 

 

“You’re so squirmy,” Yang mutters, arm dropping her scroll and laying across Blake’s stomach. “Hold still. I’m trying to study.”

 

With a roll of her eyes, Blake slips herself onto her back once more, staring up at Yang who dangles in her vision. “You’re playing that dumb game again.”

 

“The dumb game that highlights war strategy and geography, ergo intellectually stimulating.” She shrugs as though she’s formed a rock solid case. 

 

Her arm still rests across Blake’s stomach, the weight warm and familiar. “You’re an engineering major,” Blake deadpans, challenging.

 

“I, Blake Belladonna, am a well-rounded individual.” She taps the end of Blake’s nose, breaking out in a smile when Blake scrunches her face up in response. 

 

Blake pokes a finger into her stomach, just above the exact spot Blake knows she’s most sensitive, the one that always elicits a squeal and involuntary laughter. Yang jerks in response, expecting Blake to go for her weak spot, glaring at Blake’s laughter. 

 

“Well I’m bored,” Blake declares. “Pay attention to me.”

 

There’s a smile on the edge of Yang’s lips, a gentle caress to her fingers as they run along Blake’s waist, trailing over exposed skin. “As if you don’t already demand all my attention already,” Yang answers, voice low, gaze warm. 

 

Blake swallows, the rush of adrenaline coursing through her bloodstream, pulse quickening, world simplifying. “As if you have any control over it.”

 

Warmth rushes to her cheeks, is mirrored in Yang’s. 

 

Yang’s lips part, comment dying on her lips as she hovers over Blake, hair slipping forward. Blake reaches up a hand and tucks the strands behind Yang’s ear, letting her fingers trail down along Yang’s jawline, hovering for just a minute at the edge, pads of her fingers pressing into strong bone. 

 

It’d be easy to pull herself up, meet Yang where she suspends over Blake, leaning closer whether conscious or not. Her chest rises and falls in quick succession, breaths coming fast and shallow. 

 

“You got me,” Yang murmurs, tongue darting out to wet her lips, pulling herself back, her spine set against the couch cushions once again. 

 

The words could have been teasing and light, but Yang says them with a weight, an intention. 

 

Blake turns her face away, eyes fixing on the bare skin of Yang’s legs stretched out, pink striped socks on the coffee table. “Same,” she whispers back, eyes slipping shut when Yang’s fingers run along her hair. 

 

Every part of Blake belonged to Yang. The broken pieces, the jagged edges, the truths that remained buried six feet under. The remnants of her were torn and shattered, destroyed in ways Blake didn’t know if they would ever quite be fixed. They were fragments of a human with the potential to destroy further, damage greater. In a singular look, Yang had decided to take it all, the particles of destruction forged into pieces of potential. 

 

“You have all of me.”

 

\--

 

_ 14 _

 

The line rings exactly once before going dead. Yang pulls her scroll away from her face, checking her signal before pressing the call button again.

 

It’s been months since Blake had told Yang not to call anymore, but Yang needed her. She’d put in an effort to hold off, to stand tall on her own and give Blake some space, even though it worried Yang, even though she was terrified. Their last conversation hadn’t been right. It wasn’t just because Blake was acting pissy and being an ass, there was something more. Yang could feel it beneath the surface of the words, tucked away in her phrasings. Red flags were going up.

 

Even still, she held her composure, restrained herself to (mostly unanswered) texts. Today she needs Blake. There’s no one else for her to go to, no one else who could even begin to understand—no one else who even knows.

 

This call does the same thing. One singular ring before it drops. 

 

“Stupid piece of shit,” Yang mutters to herself, throwing it down on her bed and storming out of her room. “Dad!” she calls, turning the corner to his room. “I need to borrow your scroll.”

 

He’s disheveled, not that it was unusual for his room to be cluttered, his clothes half-wrinkled. “Sure, kid,” he passes it over without question, barely looking in her direction.

 

With the door shut to her room, Yang waits with her breath held as the line rings; a small exhale escaping as the second ring starts.

 

On the fourth, she gets a, “Hello?”

 

“Blake,” Yang doesn’t mean to sound so relieved, to let it slip into her voice that she feels like her feet are on solid ground for the first time in weeks. “Listen, I really need-”

 

“Where are you calling from?” The words are clipped, tone demanding. 

 

Yang bristles, at once hating how this encounter had been shaped by a brushing fleet of desperation, a rising tide of vulnerability, an instinct of trust that was ingrained even after contradictory examples. “My scroll wasn’t working.” The answer is indirect. 

 

Silence holds the other end. Yang waits with her breath trapped deep within her lungs as if the oxygen can be kept there in case the words that follow are enough to impede involuntary actions like lungs breathing and hearts beating. 

 

“I told you not to call.” Blake speaks in hushed tones, her voice urgent. “I can’t talk to you.”

 

The statements feel heavier than their last conversation, like Blake forces the words out even though she doesn’t want to. It’s equal parts a relief and a concern. 

 

“I needed-”

 

“No,” Blake cuts her off, clearing her throat. “I don’t want to talk to you.” She speaks loud and clear, direct. “Please, just leave me alone.”

 

The line goes flat, no static of potential as Yang waits for more words to follow. There’s nothing. 

 

“I needed you,” Yang says to the scroll in her hand, the background of a child-sized version of herself and baby Ruby staring back at her. 

 

Her scroll buzzes beside her and her heart doesn’t just jump; it grows wings and sprouts out of her chest, set free in search of hope that should be so far off but remained clenched tight, a bird unallowed to take flight. 

 

The number that wasn’t programmed in but in the last hour had become familiar lights up on the screen. Her mother’s text displayed. 

 

The hope struggles against her grip. Yang clamps down tighter.

 

\--

 

_ 24 _

 

Blake’s the next witness called, and Yang sits below, watching her climb the steps, raise her right hand, swear the truth. Blake’s always been smaller, even when they were seven with scabbed up knees and half-grown limbs. Yang was taller, bigger, stronger, but now Blake is almost invisible. She sinks into the seat, seeming to disappear.

 

Blake is asked roughly the same questions, starting easy with things like her name, her job, the opening events of that night. Her voice trips, trembles, when she reaches the part of the story that includes the numbing realization, the fear, the pain. She speaks clinically with concise phrases and technical terms. 

 

In the beginning, Yang was convinced she could block Blake out. That, when this day rolled around, she could just plug her ears and hum and never be forced to listen to this side of the story. The side she never got a chance to hear, the one she’s desperately wanted answers on for years. What was it like for you? How did it feel? Were you afraid we were going to die? Did it scare you more when it was me who might die, or yourself?

 

Those aren’t the questions their lawyer asks, but Yang can’t help listening. She was desperate for answers. There was no peace in ignorance.

 

The answers don’t bring peace either; Yang decides when court adjourns following Blake’s statement. They bring that same familiar wave of sadness in a rush, so strong she swears it could knock her down.

 

//

 

Not reliving that night had become a professional practice of Blake’s. It took legitimate skill to keep the memories at bay, to go anywhere but to  _ that  _ night. 

 

Going to such a moment in a courtroom filled with everyone she cares about watching her, along with the person who had tormented her for years...well, that was just shitty. 

 

Their lawyer was nice, gentle, asked her questions that were simple to answer, didn’t require for her to delve too far into the worst of it. It could’ve been worse. But god was it awful just the way it had happened.

 

The whole time, she could feel the eyes on her. There was no denying the contempt coming from Adam’s side of the room, no disputing the supportive stares her parents kept trained on her, no chance of ignoring Yang’s unbreakable gaze. So words weren’t allowed between them. They’d have to settle for looks. Looks might be harder, might drive her to insanity if she can see Yang, study her, analyze her, remember how those trembling hands used to touch Blake’s back and neck and hair. How those lilac eyes would soften and warm. She could see all of that, but it ended there—no talking, no touching, nothing more. 

 

It was a small punishment to pay for everything that had happened.

 

After the court’s adjourned, Blake doesn’t move from the stand until she knows Adam’s been pulled from the room, keeps her eyes trained on the floor even after. 

 

She expects her parents to be at her side first, but instead, it’s Sun with Neptune a step behind him. He’s there as soon as she’s stepped through the barrier, throwing his arms around her, tale flicking back and forth behind him. 

 

“You did great,” he assures her, pulling back with hands on her shoulders, squeezing. Neptune puts a hand on her back, shooting her a smile.

 

They’re in front of her, offering the best form of support they can, but her eyes are searching for someone else, watching the door swing shut.

 

“Thanks,” she says, voice little more than a croak. 

 

Next come her parents. They didn’t talk much; she screened their calls, avoided all offers for her to visit or them to come to her. But they’re here—supportive, loving, gentle. Blake doesn’t know if she should hate them or if they should hate her. They remained constants no matter how much she pushed them away, though. The answer seemed obvious. 

 

Hands are everywhere, people close, words seeming to fly right over her head. There are people touching her shoulders and her back, and she thinks her mom is the one kissing the top of her head and they are still in this goddamn courtroom. 

 

“I need to use the bathroom,” she says, pulling out of the moshpit of affection that had descended. Solitude was never something she  _ had _ to live with. It was something she chose. 

 

Outside of that room she can breathe, can walk, can feel. She pushes open the bathroom door, grateful that the people who could follow her in here were limited. 

 

Weiss is at the sink, hands curled around the edge, arms shaking. Her head swivels up when Blake pushes the door open, holds her there. 

 

Expectations were funny. They rarely are met. At least, that’s what Blake decides when Weiss comes rushing forward—arms extended, body wrapping around Blake’s in a flash. She’s crying, helpless little sobs against Blake’s chest as Weiss rests her chin on her shoulder. 

 

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry,” she keeps muttering as she pulls away, wiping under her eyes with caution as if her makeup could still be salvaged. “It’s been so long.”

 

Not long enough, Blake doesn’t say. “I’ve missed you,” she goes for instead. And she has. She misses all of them, like she didn’t know she could, like most of her has been left on this island, the scattered pieces of what was left being dragged around Remnant becoming more torn and weary in the process. 

 

“We’ve missed you too,” Weiss answers, hand smoothing down her hair, attempting to recenter herself into a form of assembled. “All of us.” The statement is pointed enough. 

 

“I know.” 

 

Missing someone isn’t enough, though. Blake understands that just fine. 

 

\--

 

_ 21 _

 

The nightmares don’t ever go away. They lessen over the years, both in frequency and intensity, but even what could be a whole lifetime later, Blake still startles awake, skin sticky, breaths shallow, hands trembling. 

 

There’s a moment before she opens her eyes, where she’s stuck in between. Reality begins to sift in but the imagery, the fear, continues to linger on her chest and holds her close. When she opens her eyes, the world around her shifts back into place.

 

Yang doesn’t always wake up, depending on how restless Blake becomes, but she always pulls her closer, one arm tightening its grip, other wrapping around to stroke Blake’s hair, run along her arm, half awake enough to know that the extra reassurance is needed.

 

Every once in a while, that is enough. Those small, half-conscious movements can still her soul. Most nights, though, she ends up pulling herself on top of Yang completely, letting her body melt into her, trembling to her core, arms wrapping tight, face buried in her neck.

 

That’s enough to wake Yang up in an instant. She wraps Blake up in arms of safety, whispers in her ear with tones of love. No matter what, Yang offers what is needed.

 

“I’m here,” she says into Blake’s ear, sitting up slightly so she can cradle her closer, hold them together. “It’s okay, Blake. You’re safe.”

 

When she’s calmed enough that she can talk, Yang will make her repeat the mantra back. “You’re here. It’s okay. I’m safe.” Yang will say it first; Blake parrots it back.

 

Eventually, her heart stills. In time, her body no longer trembles. 

 

“I love you,” Blake murmurs, lips close enough to Yang’s skin that she can lay a kiss there without effort. 

 

“You have no idea, Belladonna,” Yang will whisper back, hands trailing, warming. Those hands set free the demons and let in the light. 

 

The world settles, reality firmly in place, her past fading with each calming breath she draws in. Dimming further still with every grounding, cementing exhale. “I think I might,” she answers. 

  
  


\--

 

_ 16 _

 

The camp is only part way formed, a conglomeration of tents and overtaken abandoned buildings. Blake knows this plan isn’t developed, hasn’t matured in a logical fashion. She tried to warn Adam, to tell him how badly this could go, the lives that could be lost on all sides. 

 

He hadn’t wanted to listen and silenced her with the back of his hand. 

 

She eats dinner that night next to Ilia, sitting on a log and staring into the fire as she chokes down the chili. The tension radiates off the both of them, knowing this all seemed like a bad idea but not having the guile to fight and prove it.

 

Sienna approved it, Adam told the group he assembled. No one else ever heard this message of approval. Blake had her doubts, though she’d learned plenty in the past that her doubts were to be punished. Adam didn’t need to prove himself to her, he would say, she was the one who had to fix herself, fix how she thought of him, treated him...trusted him.

 

The food is warm, not hot, more beans than anything else, but it was something. These missions had become less organized, feeling more and more like a group of bandits wiping out an area just because.  _ What message is this spreading?  _ Blake had demanded.  _ What are we accomplishing?  _ Not for the first time since they’d left, Blake wishes her parents were here. Her dad knew how to bring things into perspective; her mom had a gentle touch of explaining the pieces Blake had missed.

 

But they’d left, given up at the first sign of having to do more, be more. They were scared because they weren’t ready to commit; that was what Adam said. But Blake was. Blake was here and she was going to stay. There was no talking to those who had abandoned their mission, who weren’t willing to see it through and make the sacrifices necessary.

 

Never talking to them is hard. Adam doesn’t understand that. His life before the White Fang had been empty, miserable. He didn’t have parents to miss. His friends had died in the factories. Same with Ilia. The suffering among them all was shared, some hurting in ways very different from others. Blake doesn’t feel like she has the right to complain about missing the happy portions of her life she’s lost, the joy she’d known before joining the White Fang. That was joy she needed to surrender for a cause so much bigger than herself. How could she be so selfish to think she deserves to put herself above others?

 

There’s a new guy who’s joined. He’s got a monkey tail that swishes with ease, his posture loose, his jokes constant. That will change, he’ll need to learn to put that stuff aside, focus on their goals first, the parts of himself buried beneath the driving force of the group as a whole.

 

Tonight she’s the last one out by the fire, the last one remaining on the logs, staring at the flames. She’s weak, tired. She doesn’t have it in her to go back to her tent and hear about how she’s wrong. Tomorrow would be a fight of its own. She doesn’t have any more in her for it to continue tonight. 

 

The new guy sits next to her once the sky is completely dark, even the moon covered by a cloud. The guards are the only ones still out. She knows Adam will come looking for her soon. He’ll be aggravated that she hasn’t come to bed already. 

 

“I’m Sun,” the boy says, extending his hand. When she doesn’t shake it, he moves it to rub at the back of his neck, turning so he’s facing the fire. “You’re Blake, right?”

 

She looks over her shoulder, checking. “Yes,” she answers. “I’m Blake.”

 

“So how ‘bout that plan for tomorrow,” he chuckles nervously. “Is this usually how the White Fang decides to do things? ‘Cause I gotta say it’s pretty-”

 

“Shh,” she silences him. People were loyal to Adam. “How long ago did you join?” she asks, creating safer conversation.

 

“I’m still in initiation,” he says, legs spread out in front of him, one ankle crossing over the other. “Do you guys do hazing around here? ‘Cause I gotta say-”

 

“No,” she cuts him off again. “You don’t.” She turns to him, a new sense of urgency to protect this guy who seems so innocent, so undeserving to be dragged into this mess. “Trust me.”

 

He nods, eyes blinking as the right side of his face is cast into shadow when he turns to watch her. “Okay, sure thing, Blake.”

 

The air around them runs cold. “Blake.” She doesn’t need to turn to know where Adam stands. She was always on high-alert, hyper-aware of how close he is, what side he’s on, where he might be next. “You should get some sleep.”

 

She stands, hands tucking into her pockets. “Goodnight, Sun,” she says, not waiting for a response before silently following Adam back to their tent.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks so much for the response last chapter! I'm just kind of updating as I go through and piece things together and edit. Hope you continue to enjoy as we continue moving forward :)


	3. Chapter 3

_ 12 _

 

As Ruby got older, she started going to the occasional sleepover on her own.

 

One of those Saturday nights, when it was just Blake and Yang and a bowl of popcorn on Blake’s bedroom floor, is when they first discover how electricity travels through the heart itself.

 

Music is playing in the background as Yang flips through a magazine, laying on her stomach. “Ew,” she says instinctually when she flips to a page of two celebrities kissing. The guy’s at the forefront, pushing into the woman, dominating, only the side of the woman’s face can be seen.

 

Blake looks over her shoulder at the reaction and laughs. “Aren’t we too old to think kissing is gross?” she asks, dark purple nail polish still half-damp on her toes. 

 

“Almost thirteen is a perfectly respectable age to think boys are gross,” Yang answers, not intending to change Blake’s original statement but twisting it around anyway. “I mean, think about it. Boys have literally never been grosser!”

 

Blake wrinkles her nose, laughing. “Okay, you aren’t wrong,” she gives in. “But that doesn’t mean kissing is gross.” There’s something about the way she says it, innocent yet hinting, eyes looking at Yang instead of the magazine in front of them. 

 

“I’m still not buying it,” Yang shrugs, head tilting as she looked at the picture again. “It’s a spit swap.” Blake giggles. “What?”

 

“It just reminds me of when we spit in our hands to form our unbreakable bond,” she laughs, and Yang joins in, rolling her eyes at their dramatic eight-year-old selves.

 

“Well in that case,” Yang says with raised eyebrows and a goofy set to her lips, “we practically have already kissed.”

 

Blake stops moving for a minute, and Yang’s heart picks up its rhythm, her palms sweating as her voice echoes in her head.

 

“Using that logic…” Blake starts, meeting Yang’s gaze, nail polish and magazines and popcorn forgotten.

 

“Yes?” Yang prompts.

 

Blake glances to the door and then back at Yang. “We might as well...practice on each other,” she says in a hushed voice. “You know, so we’re ready for the real thing.”

 

“The real thing,” Yang repeats, losing herself in Blake’s golden eyes, curious how the real thing would compare to what they could be about to do right here and now. “Sure,” she answers, never one to back down from a challenge.

 

“O-okay,” Blake hesitates as if she wasn’t expecting Yang to agree so quickly, as if she was starting to doubt her own suggestion.

 

“Only if you want to, of course,” Yang says, looking down at the carpet, swirling her finger into the fibers. It wasn’t that she had spent  _ a lot _ of time thinking about kissing Blake. It had crossed her mind, sure, but Blake was right. Of course they would want to do this with each other first—no fear of judgment, no worry about doing it wrong or embarrassing yourself.  Kissing Blake was logical, plain and simple.

 

“I do,” Blake answers, the two words causing Yang’s heart to jackhammer in her chest. 

 

If it were the sort of thing she could control, she’d make it stop. After all, the whole point of this was so that it didn’t make her nervous.

 

Yang pulls her legs beneath her, sitting on her knees, body already leaning towards Blake. “Do you know what to do?” she asks. The basic concept had been laid out in front of them in TV shows and movies. Yang asks for the sake of having something to say.

 

“As much as you do,” Blake shoots back, touching her toes to make sure the paint is dry before shifting her own position. 

 

Yang expects when they look at each other that they’ll dissolve into giggling messes, falling into one another over the absurdity of this. As it all fell into place because they’d once shaken spit filled hands behind the jungle gym in the third grade. 

 

“You don’t know that,” Yang challenges, the rate of her words increasing. “For all you know, Blake Belladonna, I have done extensive research, theoretical and practical.” It’s an out of body experience. Yang can feel herself bragging, can’t quite figure out why she feels the need to impress Blake so much all of a sudden. “I could be a pro and you could-”

 

The words aren’t even in her brain anymore as soon as Blake’s lips are meeting hers. It’s supposed to be awkward, Yang is shouting in her head, it’s supposed to feel gross, unnatural. Except her eyes slip shut and her lips part, just slightly, fitting Blake’s lower lip in between her two, holding it there before sucking gently, following her instincts. 

 

This wasn’t a peck on the lips, followed by raucous laughter and tears streaming from their eyes. This was right. It was the start of the universe and the end of a world all in one go. In ten seconds, Yang has come to realize she’s impossibly in love with her best friend and equally accepted she will most likely never get the chance to do this again. 

 

Yang pushes up on her knees, so she’s taller than Blake now. Their lips separate for a second from the shift in movement, but they both pretend not to notice, reconnecting, shifting, finding their footing.

 

Yang sinks into Blake and Blake grows further up into Yang. It’s no push and pull; they are simply disappearing into one another.

 

It’s the most wonderful feeling in the entire world.

 

\--

 

_ 24 _

 

Court, it turns out, is exhausting. Yang comes home and orders a pizza, putting on her pajamas and falling onto the couch. She knows Ruby and Weiss are exchanging looks, questioning each other on what they should do. The answer is easy enough: Nothing.

 

Ruby gets that first, she always has. She sits down next to Yang, closer than usual but not too close, pulling out her homework and writing notes, her elbow bumping into Yang’s every so often as she scribbled down answers in her half-formed version of handwriting. 

 

Weiss sits on the floor, back leaning against the edge of the sofa, laptop in front of her. She rubs a hand along her face as she delves into more studying, her BAR study book propped open next to her.

 

“Thanks, guys,” Yang says sometime later, pizza box in front of them, Ruby partway to sleep against Yang’s side. 

 

Weiss turns, eyes tired as she stares at Yang from the light of the television alone. “You should talk to Blake.”

 

Yang stiffens, ready to push Ruby off of her and go straight for her room. “I retract my gratitude,” she says, hoping that expresses her message of not interested well enough.

 

“Yang,” Weiss sighs, voice always close to exasperation. “She’s hurting too. You have to know that.”

 

Of course she did. Yang knew Blake was hurting without seeing her, could feel it in the air, the knowledge traveled from Vacuo or Atlas or Mistral or wherever else Blake may be, floated in on a breeze and settled in Yang’s chest as an ache that could not be soothed. “She has her people.” It isn’t meant to come across bitter, but it sounds as if Yang is spitting a lemon out of her mouth.  _ She made her choice _ , is what she doesn’t say.  _ It wasn’t me.  _

 

“And you have yours,” Weiss says with a pointed look. “It doesn’t mean you ever stopped needing each other.”

 

\--

 

_ 17 _

 

Christmas at seventeen was well beyond having lost its magic. 

 

Ruby, at fifteen, didn’t exactly agree.

 

She bounds into Yang’s room in the morning, bouncing on the end of her bed with Zwei who stands with his paws next to Yang’s face, licking her cheek. She reaches over, petting between his ears while simultaneously pushing him away.

 

“Come on,” Ruby says as Yang rubs at her eyes. “Even Dad’s up already. Move your ass!”

 

“Alright, alright,” she says, foot colliding with Ruby’s shoulder and pushing her towards the edge of the bed as she screeches. At fifteen, Ruby was supposed to be somewhere between surly and sarcastic, but the innocent, bright nature she’d carried as a child never seemed to lessen. She was vivid, carried herself lightly, as if nothing in the world weighed her down. Like she still believed Christmas was something magical. 

 

Their dad is at the stove, flipping slices of french toast, humming along to the Christmas music playing on the radio, the coffee pot brewing. “‘Bout time, Little Dragon,” he says the second she walks in the kitchen, reaching out to wrap an arm around her shoulders and a kiss pressed to the top of her head. “What happened to my early morning riser?”

 

She stayed up half the night caught between dreams and nightmares, Yang holds back, reaching for a mug. “Ruby’s got that covered on Christmas.”

 

“Yep!” She’s already got hot chocolate, whipped cream bottle held over her open mouth as it whooshes out of the can. 

 

Yang shakes her head. “And I’m pretty sure it’s entirely out of an attempt to consume a week’s worth of sugar before ten.”

 

“So you mean most days?” he jokes back, shaking his head even as he adds extra chocolate chips to her pancakes on the griddle. 

 

“Touche,” Yang answers as the doorbell rings. She looks to her dad who shrugs his shoulders and Ruby who momentarily looks up and casts the door a look, eyebrows furrowing. “Are we expecting anyone?” 

 

They shake their heads, and Yang takes tenuous steps towards the front door, arms crossing over her chest as she pulls it open. The cold air blasts against her exposed skin as she stands in the doorway in her sleep shorts and T-shirt, hairs rising on end from the cold. 

 

Ghira and Kali Belladonna are standing on the other side, wrapped boxes in hand, proper coats, hats, and mittens on. Ruby peers around Yang’s shoulder, like a kid looking between her mother’s legs, before darting out and throwing her arms around both of their necks, feet hanging from the ground like she’d done when she was ten. They wrap their arms around her but don’t look away from Yang who stands there, frozen.

 

“We wanted to drop some things off,” Kali says, hand cupping the side of Ruby’s face as she pulls back.

 

Their dad is coming up from behind Yang next, spatula in hand, apron on, and a smile lighting up his face. “Well if it isn’t the Belladonnas!” he says, waving a hand. “Come in. It’s freezing out.”

 

They do, packages passed off to Ruby, coats remaining on as they hover in the doorway. The adults exchange pleasantries as Ruby adds the gifts to the pile beneath the tree and reappears to slip into a one-armed hug from Ghira. 

 

“Yang,” Kali says, turning to her. “We wanted to wish you a Merry Christmas and also…”

 

“We were hoping you might be willing to talk to us, just for a bit,” Ghira finishes. “We’re sorry to interrupt your holiday, but-”

 

“Yeah, whatever,” Yang cuts him off. She crosses her arms, presses her lips together as she shifts from one foot to the next, the boards squeaking beneath her bare feet. Ruby slips away before reappearing to drape the afghan from the couch around Yang’s shoulders. 

 

Her dad and Ruby silently vanish back to the kitchen where at least a wall separated them from the foyer and the living room. If Yang wasn’t so angry, she would invite Blake’s parents to sit down with her, but instead, she tightens the blanket around her like armor and fixes them with a hard stare. “So?” she demands.

 

Kali’s eyes are filled with tears already and Ghira rests a hand on her shoulder. “It’s about Blake,” he starts, and of course it is. What other reason could they have for being here? “She called us last night. That...that was the first we have heard from her in almost a year now.”

 

At least now they understood—could sympathize with the loss Yang had suffered so many years ago, just a kid who shouldn’t have been so familiar with loss and betrayal but instead was wrapped in familiarity as Blake faded away. “That’s nice,” she says, intending for her voice to be hard and callous. It comes out softer, a question burning the back of her throat as the words built on her tongue.

 

“The first thing she asked was about you,” Kali says, having pulled herself together. She goes to reach out a hand but drops it before it reaches Yang. 

 

It’s not fair that hearing this makes her heart stutter out of rhythm, isn’t right that she hears the fact that Blake had been wondering about her and it sends her mind down a road of memories, hopes that were never to be realized, a reality never lived. 

 

“We’re so worried,” Kali continues on. It’s not hard to commiserate, not when Yang has been worried for years, having nightmares about what was happening to Blake. She existed somewhere between believing Blake was in mortal danger and that Yang personally really was just that undesirable, the whole world had no choice but to be repelled by her, running from the threat she poses. “The situation in the White Fang, at least where we were, it’s not good.”

 

“I know,” Yang answers. “It’s that Adam guy, right?” She could sense it from the very first time Blake had mentioned his name, had known it long before the phone calls stopped, before Blake’s parents stood here in front of Yang and expressed their worries.

 

They exchange a look before nodding. “Yes. He is definitely...exacerbating the issues at large.”

 

“Did you not think to be concerned about the fact that your thirteen-year-old daughter was being pursued by a man six years older than her? Were there no alarm bells when a nineteen-year-old was offering her special attention? Did it really take leaving to see that there was something wrong?” Yang demands this with her frustration growing, untamed and set free. They had been responsible for this. They were the ones who dragged their daughter away from her home, away from Yang, to join some revolution and now had the audacity to come crying when it went wrong. 

 

“We didn’t-”

 

“Think? Use basic judgment?” She’s yelling, the embers crackling, the oxygen of anger breathing them to life. “Care that your daughter was falling victim to someone who was clearly controlling her? Hurting her?” Yang  _ knows _ . She can feel in her veins that this whole thing has been wrong from the beginning, knows every night that Blake is suffering, that someone is hurting her, manipulating her. “Were you too wrapped up in some vigilante desires to save the world to identify your daughter was in danger too?”

 

They have the decency to look guilty. Ghira looks into Yang’s eyes, his body lowering so he was on her level instead of towering over her. “We know we’ve messed up.” He sighs, his eyes shifting to the side as they fill with tears, the regret obvious. “Our mistakes are not for anyone to forgive, especially not you, Yang.” 

 

At least they didn’t expect her forgiveness. She wasn’t about to offer it. “So then why are you here?”

 

Another look exchanged between the two of them. “You owe none of us anything,” Kali says, “but we hope that Blake starting to reach out is a sign she’s considering coming home to us.” The hope is one Yang isn’t a stranger to, but it’s been four and a half years, and she’s still standing here alone. “All we can ask is that if Blake reaches out to you, if you could ask her to come home.”

 

As if Yang could ever do anything else. What a fucking joke. “Of course,” she says without her bitterness, without fire or even a hint of heat. “I want her home too. I want...I want her safe.”

 

They don’t seem surprised that Yang is clearly clued in to some extent. Maybe they understand that Blake and Yang connected on a deeper level, maybe they know if Blake has felt Yang’s pain during this time as well. 

 

“Thank you,” Kali says softly, arms wrapping around Yang, Ghira resting a hand on her back. “Thank you, Yang. We love you so much, sweetie. And we’re so sorry, though we know that changes nothing.”

 

It doesn’t, but Yang softens regardless. She can sense their guilt over the choices they made, that if they could take it back, they would. She nods, not offering anything else in return. She doesn’t know if she has anything to give. 

 

They turn to leave, Ghira’s got his hand on the doorknob when Yang cries out, “Wait!” before she can stop herself. They do, turning to face her. “What did she...what did she ask? About me.”

 

Kali’s answering smile is sad. “If you were happy,” she answers simply, pressing a kiss to Yang’s cheek before they turn and leave, the door shutting softly behind them, the sound of it pulling shut resonating through her skull. 

 

“Yang?” Ruby’s asking a second later, chocolate smeared in the corner of her lips, fingers twisting together. 

 

As much as Yang wants to offer more of herself, reassurance and jokes and her loud, bright personality, she keeps her back to Ruby, drawing in slow, even breaths. “I just need a minute,” she says, turning up the stairs, keeping her head down so Ruby is unable to see the tears already making their way down her cheeks. 

 

\--

 

_ 24 _

 

“It’s day two of a trial, Ruby. We aren’t going to a funeral.” Yang is equal parts more and less on edge today and Ruby showing up in the kitchen in goddamn black, and a sullen look on her face was not how she was starting her day, so help her god. “Change your clothes.”

 

“I wear this all the time!” Ruby argues, arms spanning out, voice rising a few octaves. 

 

“Change.”

 

“The same could be said to you,” Weiss says as she walks in from her room. “Maybe if you and Blake would listen to any of your lawyer’s advice this would be over sooner.”

 

Hm, so Blake was ignoring him too. Yang always did like her rebellious side. “Well, maybe we aren’t willing to sacrifice a version of ourselves for the sake of depicting weak, helpless victims who are so lost the jury has no choice but to give us the vengeance we deserve.” The we slips out unintentionally. Yang was so used to them being a we, even now.

 

“Okay, definitely don’t say vengeance again.”

 

“Aye, aye, Captain,” Yang offers a two-fingered salute, grabbing a banana off the counter and slipping her shoes on. “I’ll see you guys there.”

 

“Don’t tell me you’re walking,” Weiss demands as Ruby stalks off to her room to change.

 

“Don’t ask.”

 

//

 

“The court calls Adam Taurus to the stand.” 

 

Today Yang and Blake sit with Ironwood who rises to begin asking questions. He stands between the tables on each side, first addressing Adam and asking his name. With Ironwood gone, nothing separates Blake from Yang besides an empty, vacated seat. In an attempt to look anywhere but at the man on the stands, Blake looks over to Yang, grateful that she’s here, that even if they’re nothing to each other now, this is still something they are able to finish together. 

 

Yang’s already looking back at her, neither of them turns away immediately.  _ I see your pain. I feel it too. Let me live inside of you, just for now.  _ It’s mutual; Blake knows that much. Despite how Yang has denied her, Blake knows she’s seeking the same thing Blake can’t stop searching for. For right now, they give it.

 

Undoubtedly, Adam’s lawyer has been pushing for his client to play up the same angle Blake and Yang’s has. Weak, victimized, unrightfully harmed. Adam wears it better than either of them do.

 

His voice is soft. His answers turn into excuses halfway through. Why he’s become what he is, what has been done to him, how he has suffered. Blake’s heard it all, those same justifications followed her into her dreams, consumed her when she was young. She was used to those same rationalizations being shouted in her direction, angry and bitter and spiteful. Now they’re less angry, just pitiful.

 

Blake has no pity.

 

He says her name, and there’s no fighting her instincts. She turns to him immediately, eyes finding his face, body bracing against him. Her muscle memory reacted to him saying her name before her mind could even connect the dots. She was in defense mode in an instant, ready for impact. 

 

It was a trick to force her to face him. He’s angry they’ve refused to look at him so long, managed to get through an entire day without glancing towards him, as if they were above him. This concept is sure to enrage him. He was in control, even now. Saying her name was all it took to remind Blake of that.

 

A snap of the fingers and she stood up straight; raise of the hand and she flinched. Time didn’t change anything, not really. 

 

“Blake and I were together,” he tells the jury, and she flinches against his admission. That was information she knew would come to light but didn’t want it to. “I had reason to believe that she was being manipulated, by a human at that.”

 

How dare he try and bring this back around to race. This game between them had stopped being about humans and faunus a long time ago. 

 

“She wasn’t herself. I was trying to help her.” He looks to her, and she can’t break free, can’t snap out of the trance he’s dragging her into, the memories those eyes hold, the imprint across his left eye that she’d stared at so many times before, run her fingers along tenderly, used as reasoning over and over again. “She needed me, and I was only trying to be there.”

 

Ironwood adjusts his posture. “Tell me, Mr. Taurus, how exactly you were lead to believe my client, Ms. Belladonna, was in trouble. Did she tell you this? Did she ask for your help? Did stabbing her help her?”

 

“Blake and I were together for years,” he argues simply. “I knew her like no one else. The changes in her behavior had to be attributed to Yang. That’s what racist humans do. They manipulate you. Make you think something’s for your own good.” He holds his hand out beneath his eye, making an example of his words. “I was just trying to save her from a worse fate. Things got out of hand that night, Your Honor.” He looks to the judge, eyes jumping to the side a second later to make sure Blake is still watching him. “I was desperate to save her from becoming another victim. She didn’t know well enough to want to save herself.”

 

She bites the side of her tongue, forcing her teeth to hold it in place, to keep the words of reciprocation from bursting forth.  _ It’s not true. It’s not true. It’s not true.  _ “Liar,” she whispers under her breath. Only Yang can hear.

 

“I was sacrificing myself to try and save her,” Adam argues towards the judge. “Wouldn’t you be willing to do the same? For someone you love.”

 

The jury takes notes.

 

Her insides run cold.

 

\--

 

_ 17 _

 

The second beginning was a long time coming and a potential that was never guaranteed to be realized. Yang has all but given up on a chance of reconnection, a hope of reconciliation. 

 

It’s been a solid four and a half years of yearning, missing, picking up shattered pieces and pretending as if their fit is secure in the shape of herself that has been recreated. 

 

Senior year is fun. College applications are not.

 

She gets into several schools, gets scholarships to a few.

 

When it comes to deciding, Ruby sits on the end of Yang’s bed and writes out the pros and cons. The first for each list is either, “Close by!” or “Too far :(“ and Yang takes the weight of those considerations as seriously as Ruby does. 

 

There were ghosts to escape, sure, but the loss that would come with fleeing was too great. 

 

One of the state schools is across the island a few hours from home, far enough that she wouldn’t be expected to drive the distance every weekend but close enough that she could when she needed to. 

 

Her dad drives the two of them over on a Saturday morning for a tour of the campus. The first person Yang meets has white hair in a pristine ponytail, lips pressed tight together and shoulders that only tense further anytime the girl’s father places a hand on one of them. 

 

When the parents diverge for a separate meeting, the kids are led around the campus with someone roughly a year older than them; she falls into step next to Yang.

 

“My father doesn’t approve of this school in the slightest,” are the first words out of her mouth, confided to Yang for some unknown reason.

 

Just in case, Yang looks beside her, makes sure the girl isn’t talking to someone else. “Why’s that?”

 

The girl drops her posture just so, purse falling from her shoulder to hang in her hand, stride loosening even in her heels. “It’s not ‘prestigious’ enough. Roughly translates to not enough money.”

 

Yang snorts in response, unexpecting the polar opposite complaint of every other parent in the world. “He’s more than welcome to pay my tuition as well if it’ll help him sleep at night.”

 

“I’ll be sure to extend your offer.” She speaks in a formal tone; words pronounced evenly. “I’m Weiss.”

 

Yang shakes the extended hand—soft, smooth skin brushing against her calluses. “Yang.”

 

The tour is overall less than impressive. A library here, food hall there, dorm rooms with cinderblock walls and overcrowded common rooms. It’s what Yang expects, knowing the difference between real life college campuses and what is shown on TV. 

 

The unexpected comes in the form of a dark-haired girl, a black bow tied on top of her head, tucked within a group of kids receiving a similar tour across the campus.

 

Yang sees her immediately, recognizes her before even taking in the features, registering the gold eyes and ink black hair which never escaped her memory. 

 

Yang’s steps falter and the kid just behind her collides against her back. Yang still doesn’t shift, frozen on the sidewalks, eyes blinking in disbelief. After years of separation, no calls or texts or goddamn Morse code to indicate that she was even still alive, she’s here on the same day as Yang walking by in a pack ten feet away at the same time Yang had been about to disappear into the science building. 

 

She turns away from the group, not bothering to apologize to the kid who had run into her.

 

It’s a bad idea, to go over there, to get Blake’s attention. Yang’s feet lead her without consent from her head. She’s thirteen years old in search of her best friend, seven years old on a tirade of protection, seventeen and longing for the piece that has been missing for long enough Yang could nearly forget what it meant to have it. She could forget until she saw it again, then it was a loop of memories, a magnetic force dragging her towards a vital piece of herself. 

 

This group is small, a collection of mismatched stragglers. It’s probably a combination of homeschoolers and kids who were a year or two behind on college tours. Yang could easily blend in if she wanted to. 

 

Yang never was one for hiding. 

 

“Blake.” The word escapes when she’s too close to hold it back any longer.

 

Blake stops. The sea of kids diverges around her, no one bothering to drag her along. She turns to face Yang, golden irises just the same as Yang remembers, dark hair against pale skin, a worried set to her lips. 

 

“What are you-” she starts but cuts herself off with a shake of her head. “Hi, Yang.”

 

It’s a fight against nature itself that Yang doesn’t dissolve then and there. Her heart beats out of rhythm. Her hands clench into fists to keep from reaching out and touching Blake. The hairs on the back of Yang’s neck stand at attention. Every cell is reaching out in desperation for contact, for connection. 

 

“Are you leaving Menagerie?”  _ Have you left the White Fang?  _ There are so many things to say right now, a million questions to ask, but Yang doesn't have time for pleasantries, can’t process polite conversation. 

 

One of Blake’s ears twitches beneath the bow when Yang glances to it.“Yes.”

 

Nothing else for an explanation. 

 

“Are you going to school here?”

 

Someone from the group calls Blake’s name. She looks over her shoulder, waving them on, hands clenching together as soon as the motion is finished. “Are you?”

 

Yang swallows, unsure why now is when the tears threaten to overtake her. “Depends.”

 

Blake nods. “Same.”

 

_On what?_ It goes unspoken, sitting between them on the sidewalk, shining in the sunlight. 

 

_ On you.  _ The answer reflects, the honesty blinding in their eyes.

 

\--

 

_ 24 _

 

Blake is the next one called to the stand. Even though it’s only her second time participating, she’s practically memorized the swearing-in portion, gives her name to the defendant without much thought. 

 

Adam’s lawyer is a faunus named Corsac Albain. He’s from a well known and respected firm that represented the opposite of everything Schnee and Partners did under Weiss’ father, not that it would take much. With all of the recent scandals and racism claims the company has faced, most other firms were quickly becoming more well-renowned. 

 

Corsac has a fox tail swishing behind him, an overall trustworthy appearance. There’s a reason most lawyer faunus are typically those whose animals are considered trustworthy, prey over predator. 

 

“So, Blake,” he starts. “May I call you Blake?”

 

“No,” she shoots back automatically. No one else in this courtroom is addressing her by her first name. He was not going to be the exception. 

 

He smiles gently. “Very well. Ms. Belladonna, then,” he acquiesces. “I couldn’t help but notice during your original testimony that there was absolutely no mention of your former relationship with my client.” There was a reason Ironwood had damn near insisted Blake broach the subject first, give her a jumpstart on the narrative. “Would you care to explain why that is?”

 

Being up here without the person on her side as the one to ask the questions awakens a newfound anxiety, the kind that grabs you from behind and drags you into the dark before you even know you should be afraid. “I was hoping to leave that portion of my past out of this.”

 

He tsks, eyebrows furrowing. “Is that not a relevant portion of the narrative, Ms. Belladonna? Do you not see how this alters the motivations of my client and calls into question Ms. Xiao Long’s involvement?”

 

“I do not,” she says firmly. “My previous relationship with your client,” she refused to call him by his name, “is hardly something you should want to be dragged into this, considering I was fourteen at the time it started.”

 

There are murmurings in the courtroom, quiet mental math being done of just what a six-year age difference would mean in that case. It wasn’t like people didn’t know, not as though her parents hadn’t figured it out, her friends. But Yang was the only one who understood to the fullest extent. It wasn’t a part of Blake that she wanted to share with a courtroom, random members of the jury, innocent Ruby. 

 

“Professionally, yes, that is well understood,” he says, and Blake feels a pit opening within her stomach, swallowing her whole. “But my understanding is your relationship with my client did not become romantic until you were sixteen, legally able to consent, yes, Ms. Belladonna?”

 

“Well, yes, that’s true but-”

 

“Consent which you gave to my client. Regularly, freely, after years of forming a bond together. Isn’t that right?”

 

“I-I at the time yes, it was.” She doesn’t know how to make the truth apparent when she so often loses herself in the manipulation of the past. “It wasn’t right, though. He was-”

 

“He was by your side for four and a half years, wasn’t he? He recognized the same desire for equality that you possessed and the two of you worked together for a similarly focused cause.” He leans forward, head turned to the side, looking innocent and vulnerable. 

 

Blake shakes her head. “I left three months after I turned eighteen,” she argues. “I saw what was happening in the White Fang and I left because I didn’t agree with what it had become.”

 

“Exactly what Mr. Taurus made me aware of,” he answers, nodding solemnly. “He said you left and went to college, that you fell back in with old friends, that he worried for your safety and-”

 

“The only one who ever threatened my safety was him!”

 

“Order,” the judge says, though his eyes are pitying towards Blake.

 

“His involvement on the night of the accident,” the defendant starts, eyes shifting between the jury and Blake, voice placing implication on  _ accident,  _ saddened as he recalls the event he wasn’t even present for, “was a misguided attempt to protect you, Blake. What happened from there was a case of too much adrenaline and an egregious example of over-protection from Ms. Xiao Long. Who, as the jury should be aware of, was your new significant other at the time of the incident, was she not?”

 

There had been discussions on where this particular line of questioning should go, how Blake should handle it, what she should say. It goes out of her brain like it had never actually created a connection, no neurons taking hold of the information and storing it for when it was needed. “Yes.”

 

“So what happened that night included three individuals. My client who showed up to offer you an olive branch, your girlfriend—Ms. Xiao Long who became enraged at what she saw occurring and immediately launched into a physical attack—and you.” The picture paints too clearly with how he’s explaining it. Adam with a gentle hand extended, Yang flying into a fit of anger, semblance flaring as she headed straight towards Adam. Blake caught in the middle between the person she loved once before and the person she loved now. Two people at fault and she chose one to blame and one to stand beside.

 

“It’s not like that,” she argues, voice saturated with a desperation to grab a new canvas, start the painting over. “Adam was threatening us! Yang saw I was in danger. She was trying to help me.”

 

“Did Yang Xiao Long initiate the first verbal threat that night towards my client, yes or no?”

 

“Well, yes, but first-”

 

“Did Yang Xiao Long physically attack my client first, yes or no?”

 

Blake looks to her hands in her lap before looking up towards Yang who sits there, whole body shaking, eyes shifting to red, hair starting to crackle. Ironwood is pinching the bridge of his nose, not even looking at Blake. He knows the story as well as they do. They all know exactly what happened. They tried to paint exactly how it looked yesterday, but they left out the details that hurt too much, the information they didn’t want to relive. And now here they were, dealing with the truth as a whole being dredged up once more, ugly broken bits and all.

 

“Yes.”

 

The smile turns sinister, just for a second. In her peripherals, Blake can’t miss Adam leaning back in his seat, as if he’s already recognized this as a victory as if it has released a hold on his being.

 

“No further questions.”

 

\--

 

_ 20 _

 

Moving into an apartment junior year only seems logical. Housing was expensive on campus, and with Ruby deciding on the same school, it made more sense to split one rent four ways than four room and boards three especially, as Weiss like to remind them, when Blake pretty much lived in their dorm regardless.

 

They find a two bedroom just off of campus with wide windows to overlook the glorious parking lot and laminate hardwood floors that were coming up in the corners. It was perfect. 

 

The four of them move loads and loads of furniture, Yang doing the heavy lifting and forcing someone else on the other end to at least help to some extent as she hefts bed frames and the couch and Blake’s books up four flights of stairs. 

 

“Top floor sure sounded like a good idea when they said it originally.”

 

She and Blake buy off-white, gossamer curtains that aren’t effective in the slightest, but let the early morning light wake them up each morning. Neither of them ever make the bed, a unanimous decision that doing so is purely a waste of time. Yang puts all their clothes away. Blake vacuums and picks up the clutter that gathers in piles.

 

It works as well as they knew it would. Yang decides this is the only way she will live for the rest of her life, with Blake at her side. 

 

Every night they fall into bed together, a kiss goodnight, an “I love you,” before settling down. Yang lies on her back, arm stretched out to welcome Blake against her side. Blake rests her head on Yang’s chest, breathing her in and pressing her lips in a kiss to her collarbone. 

 

Yang also decides this is the only way she’ll sleep forever.

 

“To the RWBY household!” Ruby declares their first night in the half-filled apartment.

 

Weiss raises an eyebrow as Yang drops the glass that was halfway to her lips and Blake cocks her head to the side. “Why exactly is this  _ your  _ household?” Weiss asks with a sneer. The two of them were getting on marvelously, really. Yang was sure insisting they could share a room wouldn’t blow up in her face at all. 

 

“No, no,” Ruby says, vehemently shaking her head. “Not R-U-B-Y, silly.”

 

“Of course,” Blake deadpans, taking a drink even though their toast isn’t technically finished. “I always forget about those alternative Ruby spellings.”

 

Yang chuckles, fingers of her free hand bumping delicately against Blake’s.

 

“As in R-W-B-Y,” she points to each of them with the corresponding letter of their first name.

 

“That does not spell Ruby,” Weiss argues. “That spells...nothing! It can’t even be pronounced.”

 

“Hence the adjustment,” Ruby says with a nervous smile, rubbing the back of her neck. “I’ll keep working on it.”

 

Yang laughs. “Household BRWY!” she declares, holding up her beer. “Get it? Like a brewery.”

 

Weiss picks up her plastic cup of freaking champagne and holds it out. “Never mind. I’ll go along with RWBY before Yang starts making her own beer in here to fulfill a pun.”

 

The suggestion makes Blake laugh, only further drawing it out of her when Yang looks to her with a shocked expression. “That is an unfair accusation, and you know it!” Yang argues.

 

“You will go pretty far to make a pun work,” Ruby says with a solemn nod. “You get it from Dad.”

 

“Drink your wine cooler and shut up,” Yang grumbles with a sip of her beer. “At least I didn’t get his klutziness like you did.”

 

“Aw c’mon.” Blake bumps her shoulder against Yang’s. “Don’t get bitter, Wheatie.”

 

“Did you seriously...I’m not going to start brewing my own beer!”

 

Weiss and Ruby laugh, high fiving Blake. “I’m sorry,” Ruby squeaks out. “It’s the yeast I could offer.”

 

They laugh harder, to the point that Yang can’t help but join in. “Okay, that was pretty good,” she consents, “but let’s be honest here. I’m the glu-ten that holds us together.”

 

“Awful.”

 

“Atrocious.”

 

“You’re lucky you’re pretty.”

 

“I hate you all,” she declares, taking another draw of her beer and heading towards her and Blake’s room. “Now you don’t get to enjoy my homemade beer!”

 

“But I called you pretty!” Blake calls after her. Their laughter drifts through the whole apartment, reaching every corner until there wasn’t an ounce of darkness left.

 

\--

 

_ 24 _

 

Lunch is a somber event today. Yang doesn’t head straight out of the building. Blake doesn’t follow wherever she goes. At first, Blake doesn’t move, much like yesterday, but then Ironwood is approaching the stand, offering his hand. 

 

“We need to talk before we’re back in session,” he says. “Grab something to eat and meet me in the last room on the right.”

 

She follows instructions, grabbing a tuna wrap and a bag of chips, dismissing the people who approach her as she makes her way to the empty conference room. There’s a sign stating no food or drink is allowed. She opens her bag of chips as the door shuts behind her.

 

There’s a large table in the middle of the room, twelve or so wooden seats around it and a singular window at the end of it all, light reflecting off of the polished wood of the table and dust motes floating in the sun that drifts in. Blake sits in a chair with it’s back against the wall, elbows placed on the armrests as she eats slowly. 

 

That could not have gone worse. Even if she had actively tried, she could not have turned that into more of a disaster. 

 

Yang walks through the door next, eyes landing on Blake with the door only half opened. Blake expects her to just turn and walk out, but she doesn’t. Instead, she steps through, throws her armload of food down on the table and falls into a chair, the metal of her right arm dinging as it taps against the wood. 

 

There’s so much to be said, but Blake remembers Yang’s comment yesterday and presses her lips together, taking big bites of her wrap. Anything to keep her mouth busy, to prevent it from spilling out words or confessions or apologies, anything to make it forget how it feels to press her lips to the girl across from her, how much she craves to do it now that Yang’s in front of her again.

 

“Good,” Ironwood says as he walks in. “You’re both here.”

 

“You told us to be,” Yang mutters.

 

“You’re right,” he says, standing at the head of the table, hands clasped in front of him. “I get that you two have a history, that there’s a lot of trauma surrounding this case, and Ms. Schnee was insistent that I work with your demands.” He fixes them both with a look as if to suggest this had been a terrible idea. “That isn’t going to work anymore.”

 

Blake looks to Yang, wondering what exactly her demands had been, if any of them mirrored her own. 

 

“I made the mistake of thinking this case would be relatively open and shut, considering the physical nature of the main accusation.” He gestures towards Yang who’s using her right hand to shovel chips into her mouth. “But I was wrong. They’re twisting this narrative in any way possible to spin Adam as a victim, the faunus card is becoming rampant, and the jury is bound to reconsider any conviction they may have felt yesterday after hearing Adam’s plea and Blake’s less than helpful follow-up.”

 

“Sorry,” she mutters.

 

“What’s your point?” Yang demands at the same time. “Want me to show up in blue tomorrow? I really don’t think it’ll make that big of a difference but sure, fine, whatever.”

 

Ironwood places his hands on the table, leaning forward. “The point, Yang, is that this guy is going to walk free or with an extremely decreased sentencing if we don’t all work together here.”

 

It was always a possibility, sure, but Blake had been told since that night in the hospital that Adam wasn’t going to be bothering them anymore. He would go to jail for sure. There was no getting his way out of this one. And here they were, talking about the likelihood of him worming his way out of this situation just like all the others. All those reassurances are out the window, and Blake can’t help but think how this nightmare is never going to end. How a two-year reprieve was all she got before being dragged back down, back in. 

 

“I’m in,” Yang says, voice directed towards Blake, eyes steadfastly fixed on her. “Whatever we need to do,” Yang promises, not looking away as Blake stares across the table at her, scared and disappointed and lost. “I’ll do it.”

 

“Me too,” Blake adds on, aware that it’s going to hurt but willing to take on the pain if it means that just once Adam doesn’t win by manipulating the situation. “All in.”

 

“About fucking time,” Ironwood sighs. “Hope you two are ready.”

 

They definitely are not.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, I really appreciate your feedback! I know we're still kind of all over the place, but I hope the framework of the story is beginning to appear as we flow between child/teen/adult Blake and Yang. Thanks for reading and let me know your thoughts!


	4. Chapter 4

_ 18 _

 

Freshman week is orientation madness combined with alcohol and weed, and too many kids left unsupervised for the first time.

 

Yang feels like she’s at least able to manage herself similar to a functioning human being, having been left alone plenty growing up. The fact that her independence was never stifled allowed her the chance to acknowledge the freedom without losing her shit. 

 

Weiss is a different story.

 

They walk into the frat party Tuesday night with her bitching about an inconsequential matter, yammering on and on in Yang’s ear, tone derisive and judgmental over the most inane details. 

 

“Jesus Christ, Weiss,” Yang says, turning to a table filled with liquor and pouring three parts Coke and one part rum into a Red Solo cup and handing it over. “Shut the fuck up and drink already.”

 

“I was just-”

 

“Ah,” Yang cuts her off, pushing lightly on the bottom of the cup in Weiss’ hand to bring it closer to her mouth. “No talking. Just drink and stop bitching for like, two minutes.”

 

She sips, makes a face but drinks again after holding Yang’s gaze for a second. “I don’t really know what I’m doing,” she admits, taking a third sip.

 

“Tip number one,” Yang says, catching the tips of a black bow walking through the doorway, “don’t complain about everything.”

 

“I wasn’t complaining,” she argues as Blake comes up beside them, effectively causing Yang to lose all interest in Weiss’ technicalities. “I was simply pointing things out.”

 

“Tip number two,” Yang says, eyes locked on Blake’s while popping off the cap of a beer without looking, letting the light metal ring out as it hits the floor. “Just because you’re accurate does not make you interesting.” Weiss drinks again. “Go find someone else and say something worth listening to.”

 

“Where are you going?” Weiss demands, tone shrill at the thought of Yang leaving her at this party she hadn’t even wanted  to attend in the first place.

 

Blake steps closer, smile small but there, fingers brushing against Yang’s inner wrist as she steps around her, reaching for her own beverage. “I’m afraid she’s spoken for,” Blake says, her tone low, a little bit dangerous.

 

The words settle deep in Yang’s stomach, an exciting twist of her gut. The fact that the words are simply to mess with Weiss doesn’t change the effect they have on Yang physically.

 

“You didn’t mention you already had a date!” Weiss says, hand on her hip as she drinks back more alcohol, taking two big gulps before dropping her cup again. “Why did you make me come?”

 

With a shake of her head, Yang grabs the cup back from Weiss, refills it and passes it off again. “So you can loosen the fuck up.”

 

Blake laughs. Weiss glares.

 

“Have fun,” Blake says, grabbing Yang’s hand and pulling her away.

 

The two of them weave through the bodies inside, holding their cups firmly to keep them from being spilled by the gyrating forms around them. They hold each other’s hands just a fraction tighter. 

 

Outside the party is just as loud, raucous and mildly destructive. A guy approaches them, and Yang dismisses him before he can start, waving a hand in his face before words escape his mouth. Blake laughs at the dejected look as he walks away. 

 

They slip around the side of the house when keg stands start and some guy spurts half-swallowed beer and half-digested chips all over the yard. It’s the two of them and an air conditioning unit whirring, the sky overhead cloudy with singular sections of star breaking in between. 

 

“Happy second day of college,” Yang says, tapping the rim of her bottle against Blake’s cup, the plastic thunks and a small wave spills over. “My Uncle Qrow would be proud.”

 

“Oh?” Blake asks, taking a drink.

 

There’s not enough alcohol in her system to make her stupid, but Yang pushes on regardless. “In a secluded corner of a party with a pretty girl and the both of us halfway to drunk? Fuck yeah, I’ll be getting a congratulations card in the mail next week.”

 

Blake rolls her eyes. “I don’t know. He might still be pissed about the time I didn’t eat his popsicles.”

 

“He was quite bitter,” Yang laughs, joy coming freely. She’d forgotten what this felt like, what Blake made her feel. “Don’t worry. Ruby ate every last one of those reformed popsicles.”

 

Blake laughs with her, a brief chuckle before they both freeze, eyes stuck on each other, gazes connected. “I missed you so much,” Blake whispers, the truth ingrained in each syllable, her cadence alone spilling out the authenticity. 

 

The words are enough to make Yang cry; the tone is what does. It’s been a summer of healing, of attempting to reconnect with secrets still kept close to their chests, hurts not quite healed. But they were trying. Trying counted for something, maybe it was everything. 

 

“I missed you more,” Yang answers, voice halfway between broken and her usual bravado. “Being away from you…”

 

“It was like I was missing apart of myself,” Blake finishes. She knows what it was like; she’d lived through it too. “I made so many mistakes.”

 

Yang takes the hand that isn’t wrapped around her drink, presses it against Blake’s cheek, the warmth soaking through to her palm, the wetness running through her fingers. “I still forgive you,” Yang vows. Every day that Blake was gone, her dad told her he loved her, never fail. Every day since she’s been back Yang had followed example, promising Blake that, as far as Yang was concerned, she’s been forgiven.

 

“You don’t know what I did,” Blake says. They’re close enough now that Yang feels the words brushing past her lips, the darkness masquerading their closeness but their other senses discovering the truth. “The choices I made...the amount I sacrificed who I was. What I reduced myself to.”

 

If the world were to shrink just a mere inch, their lips would be pressed together; all other things would diminish in significance. “You’re still you,” Yang answers, voice dropping low, hand slipping down, fingers passing over Blake’s neck, a shiver coursing through her body in response. “That’s all that matters.”

 

“But-”

 

“The rest,” Yang says, letting her hand fall away, taking a drink of her beer. “The rest you can tell me when you’re ready. And when you do?”

 

“I’ll still be forgiven,” Blake answers. 

 

“About time you figured it out.”

 

\--

 

_ 24 _

 

Yang’s right-hand raises for the swearing in that takes place after lunch, the overhead lights reflecting on the metal surface. It seems like this alone should be enough to end the trial, her arm glinting in the light as she holds it up. Maybe if she just detached the thing altogether. The conclusion could be reached, and they could all go home. She sits.

 

“Ms. Xiao Long,” the defendant says, standing just where the barrier ends, not asking permission to approach closer. “It’s a pleasure to finally have the opportunity to talk.”

 

She glares. “I can’t say the same.” Ironwood actually groans. What? She said she wouldn’t lie.

 

“And why would that be?” he asks, eyes gleaming as if he’s already gotten her on a hook, is reeling her in just like that.

 

Yang wasn’t one for getting caught. “I’ve lived this nightmare long enough,” she answers, clearing her throat. “I’m ready for it to be over.”

 

He nods, acknowledging that she’s played the jury just now, that she’s planting the concept of pity in their minds with far greater ease than Adam had been able to. “I see.” He takes a minute, letting the silence hold them all as they wait for a question. “Tell me, Ms. Xiao Long, I believe of the claims against my client—one of them is for longterm pain and suffering, correct?”

 

“Yes, you are,” she answers. 

 

“May I approach?” Corsac directs his question towards the judge who nods. Stepping across the invisible barrier, he comes up to where Yang sits. They’re almost on eye level. “I’ve done a little research on you.” He says, looking directly at her before beginning to pace back and forth. “I read about the college you went to, how you largely received grants and scholarships. No loans, am I right?”

 

“Objection,” Ironwood barks. “Irrelevant information.”

 

“Sustained.”

 

The defendant holds up his hands in surrender. “The incident happened a few months before your college graduation, yes?”

 

“Yes, the attack,” Yang corrects, “occurred in February and I graduated that May.”

 

More scratching on notepads. “So you continued with your intended graduation and, from what I’ve discovered through your testimony and a little bit of online research, you were hired at your current job in June of that same year?”

 

She nods but quickly adds on a verbal, “Yes, that is true.”

 

“And, just from what I’ve read, the average income for a starting position in your field of engineering falls within the tax bracket mostly seen by the upper-middle class.”

 

What the hell. “Um, yes, I make decent money.”

 

He pauses, facing the jury before turning back and walking past her again. Right about now Yang would really appreciate if he would just hold still. “Would you mind demonstrating for the people how your mechanical arm works?”

 

Yang stands, stretching out her arm, bending it back, curling the fingers. “It works roughly the same as a regular arm. Just, you know, a little colder.” The jury smiles back at her, soft and warm.

 

“So, you’re suggesting that with a replacement arm that works well enough for you to continue on in a physically demanding field making well above average pay, my client has subjected you to longterm pain and suffering how, exactly?”

 

That’s one hell of a question. “Maybe ‘cause he cut off my fucking arm,” she shoots back, sitting back in her seat before the judge tells her to. Ironwood doesn’t even need his sigh from across the room for her to rephrase her answer. “Because I lost a part of myself entirely that night and no makeshift modification is going to bring it back.”

 

“But you’re living life just like the rest of us. You’re holding a job, no need for disability or even physical therapy. Nothing to indicate the loss of your arm has impacted the quality of your life.”

 

He stops in front of her, leaning forward, close enough that she could reach out and slap off his smug expression with her perfectly reasonable replacement of an arm. “Permission to spit in his face?” Yang grumbles towards the judge.

 

“Denied,” he says dryly. 

 

Narrowing her eyes, Yang leans back in her seat. “That’s really the best you’ve got?” she asks, sneering at him. “That’s one hell of a weak argument. What? Just because I can hold a job and make money the fact that my right arm is  _ missing _ forever, doesn’t matter?” She demands an answer, but he offers her nothing in return. Maybe his tactic is to let her work herself up, make her seem rash and intense, minimize the jury’s pity for a girl who has eyes that flash red and fire that has yet to be dimmed. “That losing a part of me doesn’t count anymore because it’s been replaced with metal and computers?” 

 

She fights against her natural inclination to stand up, make herself taller. She taps the wood in front of her with her right index finger. “I don’t feel a thing. You know that? There’s no pressure, no temperature, no pain. It’s just this extension of myself that I have, sure, but it’s foreign. I’ve lost a portion of my sensory experience to the world for the rest of my life, and you’re really going to stand in front of me and suggest I haven’t lost anything at all? Are you really  _ that  _ dense?”

 

Yang shakes her head, her left hand trembling in her lap, her insides quivering with the acknowledgment of what she has lost, verbally acknowledging she will never again get it back. The loss she has suffered had been far beyond an arm or sensation. The loss she fights through every day is not one for the jury to be witness to. “Can you really only think so narrowly as to see the world through wealth and work and acknowledge that my experiences have been tainted by what happened that night?”

 

He takes a step back from her and Yang knows that, to some extent, she won.

 

“If so, maybe we’re the ones who should be feeling sorry for you.”

 

\--

 

_ 15 _

 

Tai worked hard. He never had the money to show for it, but it was enough to keep his daughters supplied for. Food was always in the fridge, clothes on their backs, a house in his name for them to sleep in. 

 

The cost of loss had hit them far harder than anything else. He never concludes who it hit the hardest.

 

Ruby was only three years old when her mother died. She didn’t grasp what was happening, didn’t understand that no matter how many she times asks when her mother would be coming home that she wouldn’t. She’d watch with wide eyes as Yang and himself cried before her lower lip would start to tremble, joining in based in fear of the display in front of her alone.

 

For the first few months, Ruby took it the hardest because the comprehension of reality was lost on her tiny, optimistic soul. Being so young, though, meant she was quick to forget. Not her mother entirely, they weren’t about to allow that, but forget what it was like to have her presence filling their home, forget to miss her at every family dinner, every holiday, every bedtime. A new normal took over her life young enough that she healed differently. Still hurt, still scarred, but sad in the knowledge of missing someone in theory, missing the concept of what should be.

 

Tai had been hurt. First, it was by Raven walking out on him and Yang. Summer was there to pick up the pieces, cradling a two-week-old Yang in her arms, teasing his blonde headed baby for looking too much like her father.

 

It was only natural they would fall in love next. Co-parenting tended to do that eventually. Nobody tell Qrow, Tai liked to joke. 

 

Having Ruby wasn’t a redo. Yang was just as much theirs as Ruby. Summer loved  _ both  _ her daughters so much, she would say, tackling motherhood long before Ruby entered their lives.

 

He loved watching her with their girls, loved being together. 

 

It was hard when she would leave for work, gone days with little communication, the girls restless and unsettled because their mom wasn’t there and they didn’t understand why. They didn’t grasp that she was a fierce warrior in the world, her brashness translated to love as soon as she walked across the threshold, weapons were forgotten, fighting stances dropped.

 

Losing Summer next was so much worse than when Raven walked out on him. Summer never chose to leave them. It cleaved through him, the blade dull and brutal, never quite halving him but so, so close.

 

The only reasons he kept going were Ruby’s wide silver eyes of confusion and Yang’s broken lavender ones filling with tears of half-grasped cognizance of what the words coming from his mouth might mean. 

 

Yang’s loss seemed like an endless pool, unforgiving depths of abandonment whether intentional or not. The only constants he saw in her life were himself and Ruby. And he was never there enough; realism dictated he couldn’t be. 

 

Blake was like the conjuring of exactly what he wanted for his daughter. Always there, always present for Yang without question or hesitation. 

 

Yang was strong, never wavering in her determination, steadfastly filling in the role of mother-figure for Ruby without ever being told it was needed. When she was with Blake, Tai was relieved to see her release, her intensity never dimmed, but redirected. She was softer, not just towards Blake, but with herself. It was quite the transition to see in his tiny, seven-year-old daughter, such strong tides of shift within someone so young. 

 

The day his daughter spit out the fact that Blake was moving, Tai grew concerned. 

 

Within the first few weeks she woke up with terrible nightmares, the kind that had her screaming and crying and weak in ways Yang would never dare express when awake. 

 

Part of him wanted to put her in therapy, give her someone to talk to, try and heal the wound that was festering from the inside out before it sealed shut with the sludge of gangrene trapped within, the disintegration of infection clawing its way through her.

 

He tried to get her to open up. Yang opened up exactly as much as she wanted. Meaning she was sealed shut, shrugging her shoulders when he asked about Blake, writing off his questions, his worries. 

 

It was a different sort of pain that struck through him watching his daughter suffer, witnessing yet another bought of abandonment rip through her. She wouldn’t breathe a word of pain to him, wouldn’t admit how much she was struggling as she fought to keep herself intact. 

 

She’d hate that he saw right through her bravado, could envision her brokenness through the clear glass of confidence she attempted to cover herself in.

 

In an attempt to preserve her pride, he pretends he doesn’t, tries to mask the extra attention he attempts to offer. They start a whole bit of him demanding how she got so big, knuckles digging into the crown of her head, arms wrapping around his daughter who was almost as tall as him now. He cries on in these dramatic tones so she’s rolling her eyes and calling him a sap, but she lets him hug her, lets him offer comfort in this backward form for a few seconds before she shoves him off. 

 

“Love you, Little Dragon,” he’ll say, just like when she’d been five years old, lost and broken after spending a day staring at her mother in a casket, listening to her being eulogized, eating casseroles.

 

“Yeah, yeah.” She’d roll her eyes again because she’s a teenager and he’s fulfilling every ounce of the lame dad role in her life. “Love you too or whatever.”

 

He makes her get into a habit of hearing those words every day. Makes her acknowledge that she’s loved even when the rest of the world is trying to convince her otherwise.

 

\--

 

_ 13 _

 

The night before Blake is supposed to leave for Menagerie finds the two of them on her bedroom floor; sleeping bags stretched out so they were occupying the same space. 

 

Eighth grade starts in a few weeks and Yang is continuously reminding herself that she would be walking into class alone, no bribing the kid with the locker next to Blake into switching. No one to look forward to seeing in the halls, at lunch, at the end of the day. It brings a whole new meaning to alone, and Yang doesn’t think she’s ready to have that carved out of her again.

 

“Do you think it’s as pretty as everyone says?” Blake asks, lights off. She’s on her side, twisting the end of her sleep shirt between her fingers, eyes fixed on Yang, ears tuned to hear her breathe, the rustling of her movements, the beat of her heart. There are so many pieces to Yang, and she’s suddenly in the business of trying to commit them all to memory so she has something to hold onto when they’re an ocean apart.

 

Yang’s hand reaches out, brushing Blake’s hair behind her ear. “I think no matter how pretty it may be, it won’t stand a chance next to you.”

 

The oxygen in the room disappears, burned away by the fire Yang ignites with words alone. 

 

“I can’t leave you,” Blake whispers, hand reaching out to clasp Yang’s, fingers intertwining. 

 

A deep inhale is drawn, and Blake can imagine how Yang’s face sets itself, the steely determination in her eyes, the straightening of her spine. At least she knows that won’t be forgotten. “You aren’t leaving me,” Yang says. “We’re still us. We’ll just be us a little further apart.”

 

“I want to be us close up,” Blake whispers, eyes filling. It’s better to cry now than tomorrow.

 

Yang squeezes her hand before releasing, pressing a palm against her cheek, moving forward, lips pressing to Blake’s gingerly. It’s nothing like the first time, no mask to hide behind, no guise of reasoning to claim. Her lips are feather soft and familiar already. Once was all it took to commit this sensation to memory. It’s like cheating the lottery that she’s gotten to do it twice.

 

“We will,” Yang says when she pulls back, forehead pressing into Blake’s, tears spilling over to match. “I know we will.”

 

Turns out they cry both times. No one was really fooled it would be any different.

 

\--

 

_ 16 _

 

Yang is sixteen years old in the grocery store when she next thinks about Blake in any other context than abandonment. Two weeks ago, Yang’s license had been pressed into her hand, and now she was errand runner extraordinaire, taking her dad’s truck and going to the store, taking Ruby to friend’s, visiting junkyards for the pieces she needed to build something for herself.

 

It’s just meant to be a short trip—bread, milk, brownie mix for Ruby—then she remembers they have nothing for lunches the next day, none of those yogurts Ruby likes, and the sponge in the sink is six months old. Yang ends up with her arms filled with items, attempting to juggle them all as she heads for the milk before getting the hell out of here.

 

The items impede on her vision, making it near impossible to see anything below her immediate eye level. The cat ears poking up almost makes her drop everything to the multi-colored tiled floor beneath her feet.

 

She’s stuck in place, and the brownie box slips from the top of her pile, hitting the ground with a heavy  _ smack _ .

 

The ears turn in her direction, Yang sees a flash of dark hair, and her vision dims for a second, going hazy around the edges with disbelief, with hope.

 

“Yang,” the voice is warm and sweet, a gentle reassurance that Yang remembers more than once from when she was a kid.

 

“Mrs. Belladonna,” she breathes out, not entirely believing that Blake’s mom was  _ here.  _ That it meant Blake should be here too, somewhere in Vale, somewhere that they could run into each other, where they could unknowingly share the same handrail of the escalator at the mall, visit the same coffeeshop, exist in the same space even if it was never together. Blake’s hands may have touched the vegetable oil in Yang’s arms right now, picking it up before placing it back on the shelf.

 

Arms wrap around Yang in an instant. They’re weaker than she remembers, wearier. More items fall to the ground as Yang attempts to offer some semblance of a hug in return. Neither of them bothers to care.

 

“I’ve missed you,” Kali says, tears in her eyes, a wobble in her voice. 

 

Yang nods, unsure if there are words in her right now, if her larynx hasn’t just seized up out of shock and sadness and hope. “You’re back?” she asks after a minute because she can’t stand the thought of thinking this is true, thinking this is the case, and having it all be a lie. 

 

“Ghira and I moved back last month,” she says, eyes still wet, lips fixed in some twisted, false smile. 

 

“Blake?” is the only word Yang can eek out, the only syllable that can fall past her lips, broken and battered in its simplicity with an answer she already holds, settling in her chest in an instant, freezing her feet to the ground, keeping her heart in standby.

 

There’s a gentle shake of Kali’s head, hand reaching up to cup the side of Yang’s face, tender and motherly. 

 

Yang shakes it off, not able to accept the offering just now. “Where is she then?” Blake is sixteen years old. If her parents are here, then she has to be too. She shouldn’t be somewhere different. She shouldn’t have the choice to be somewhere else  _ now _ . 

 

“She refused to leave,” Kali says. “She’s with the White Fang.”

 

The organization they’d dragged her off to against her will, the one they chose to leave and left her sucked in amongst. “And you just left her?” Yang asks, voice cracking as she sees for the first time that anyone can choose to leave—just like anyone can make the choice to stay.

 

“We had to.”

 

Raven flashes by in the forefront. A failed conversation, a measly explanation and an excuse offered up. “No,” Yang says darkly, eyes glimmering red, skin on fire, ice giving way to the embers, weakening against roaring flames. “You didn’t.” She drops all of her shit onto a display, facing Kali one more time. “I wouldn’t.”

 

She goes home empty handed.

 

\--

 

_ 24 _

 

Ironwood tries to get them to go to a conference room, someone’s house, a quiet restaurant. Blake doesn’t argue. Yang does.

 

That’s how they end up in Qrow’s bar at a corner table with a dim light overhead, rock and roll playing too loudly over the speakers. Blake orders herself a whiskey sour even though she hates them, hoping the drink will only further worsen the experience as a whole. The entirety could leave a literal bad taste in her mouth.

 

Yang shoots her this look when she places her order, equal parts knowing and wondering and when she looks away her eyes fall, head hanging for a second. They aren’t used to wondering about each other. They’ve always just known.

 

“We need to claim the narrative,” Ironwood tells them for the fifteenth time. He was all about the narrative, the story they were telling the jury, how they were relating to those who would be making the ultimate decision. With a three day recess declared on the case, they would be spending the next several days preparing before re-entering the courtroom Monday morning. That meant five and a half days of meetings, preparations, and time together.

 

Yang nods, raising her beer to her lips and taking a drink. “We’ve established this. We all agree on the narrative concept, man.”

 

He glares at her in response, the two of them fixed in irritation towards each other. Blake winces against another sip of her drink. “I need to tell the whole story.” Their heads swivel to her, forgetting about their staredown. “Don’t I?”

 

Ironwood gives a firm nod as Yang faces her with a pained expression. She was the only one who could ever comprehend what that really means. Yang would grasp the depth to which she must dig in order to release those demons once more. “That could make all the difference,” Ironwood says.

 

Blake nods, small little bobs of her head as she goes from looking back at him to staring down at the table. “Okay.”

 

“Blake,” Yang says, voice quiet—quieter than the music playing and pool balls clacking together, softer than the tap pouring carbonated liquid into glasses, gentler than the makeshift karaoke taking place a few tables away. 

 

Her name is spoken like a prayer, like a memory that’s gone blurry around the edges. Her heart aches to live in that tone, to make a nest in the warmth and softness carried in that singular word. Her eyes find Yang’s without meaning to, without being told. Her instincts carry her, habits never broken, an inclination never replaced. 

 

“You don’t have to do that.”

 

“Actually-” 

 

Blake looks to Ironwood as he starts, promptly cut off by Yang again speaking her name, breathing it into the bar around them. There’s been so much to miss, so much to crave; it’s only now that she realizes the magnitude of absence that has been left in her life by not hearing Yang uttering her name in the last two years. 

 

“You don’t have to,” she offers again, eyebrows softening, gaze warm, all the tension and bitter disregard of the last couple of days melted away and revealing the same gentleness Blake has always known.

 

Sometimes too gentle for her own good, offering up possibilities that were never true, not able to be realized. “I do,” she answers, acknowledging the reality that Yang had tried to hide her from. “If we want justice then I do.”

 

The fingers of Yang’s metal hand close in a fist. “You don’t have to give him that too.” But all Blake can hear is the taunting tone of the defendant in front of her, the feeling of inadequacy that was swallowing her whole. There was a truth, a history. It was waiting to be revealed, and she hadn’t stood a chance of getting it out, not when she’d made up her mind that the version of her past was going to remain back where it belonged. 

 

“I do,” she says again, pushing the half-finished glass away from her and grabbing her jacket and purse from the back of her chair. “I don’t feel good,” she offers. “We’ll catch up again in the morning.”

 

Ironwood starts to protest but seems to give up quickly as she walks away. She suspects it’s something Yang says, does maybe. Blake doesn’t turn around to check and see, just keeps heading towards the exit and fights looking back.

 

\--

 

_ 17 _

 

It’s July. It’s been a month since Blake’s come home and there’s an undercurrent of unsteadiness between them, a trepidation that sat between words and coated their interactions. Even still, they fill up each other’s lives naturally—belongings left behind, scents of the other invading their pillows, a familiarity that time and distance could never quite erase.

 

Yang’s over at Blake’s, arriving just before noon to drag her out swimming with the promise of letting her read her book in a lounge chair and sushi afterward to tempt Blake to the water.

 

She throws Blake’s bedroom door open without saying a word, caught in surprise when she finds Blake standing there, shirt off, reaching behind her back to clasp her bikini top.

 

“Shit,” Yang says immediately, “sor-” her words drop after another second. It’s the first time since Blake has been back, Yang realizes, that she’s seen her shoulders, her back, her arms. Yang doesn’t expect the scars that are layered, the jagged, uneven lines of half-healed skin. “What the  _ fuck _ .”

 

She shuts the door, taking a step towards Blake, hand reaching for her. “What happened?” Yang demands thinking back to a half unpacked box filled with bandages and wraps. “What the fuck was going on there? Who did this to you?”

 

The pad of Yang’s thumb runs over an inch long scar on Blake’s shoulder, still pink at the edges. When she first makes contact, Blake jumps a little. Yang retracts her hand immediately. “Blake?” her voice isn’t meant to break like that, weak and whimpering like a child. Yang had always been at her weakest with Blake, the vulnerability slipping past unnoticed until it was too late. 

 

“It’s fine,” Blake says, hands grabbing her sleep shirt and pulling it over her head as a covering.

 

“It’s not,” Yang argues, head shaking, eyes wide.”It is  _ so  _ not okay.”

 

Blake doesn’t argue anymore, moving on to focus on pulling her hair up into a ponytail. “What fresh hell did you have planned for us today anyway?” she asks, changing the subject before Yang can hone in anymore. “Didn’t I hear you yammering on about swimming last night?”

 

They go to the pool. Blake keeps her shirt on the entire time.

 

\--

 

_ 15 _

 

Ruby had never really grasped privacy as a concept in her family. She busted into rooms, throwing open doors without a knock and announcing her presence by throwing herself on a bed or dramatically flopping to the floor. 

 

So it’s routine when she swings open the door to Yang’s room, math homework clutched in one hand and freshly made cookies in the other. 

 

What isn’t usual is Yang, crossed legged on her bed, staring down at her scroll with tears streaming down her cheeks. Tears that she’s wiping away before the door’s pushed all the way open. She straightens her posture and throws her scroll facedown on the bed, turning to face Ruby with red, puffy eyes and an all wrong smile. 

 

“What’s up?” She tries to play it off like nothing was out of the ordinary, like Ruby hadn’t just found her big sister in tears.

 

“Yang?” she says, putting the cookies on the nightstand, letting her homework drop to the floor. “What’s wrong?” She wasn’t a little kid anymore. Thirteen was old enough to be there for your big sister instead of her big sister always being there for her. 

 

Yang shakes her head, bites her lip. “Are those cookies?” she asks as she looks over her shoulder, hand coming up to run along her eyes once again.

 

Ruby sits next to Yang on the bed, drawing a leg up under her and resting a hand on her sister’s knee. “Yang.”

 

She looks Ruby in the eye, a half-formed smile forcing its way into place before faltering, eyes filling and head dropping. “Two years,” she whispers, the top of her head colliding against Ruby’s chest. Ruby runs her hand through Yang’s hair, smoothing it against her back. “It’s been two years and it just-she still doesn’t…”

 

“Blake.” Of course, this was about Blake. Yang hardly ever cried, at least in front of Ruby. She was cracking jokes and standing tall amongst all her friends, confident and carefree. She didn’t show weakness. Yang was too busy trying to portray herself as strong. “You still haven’t heard from her?”

 

The head pressed against Ruby’s sternum shakes back and forth. “She blocked my number.”

 

The words sting. Blake was as much a part of Ruby’s childhood as Yang had been. Blake was there for birthdays, every weekend spent with Ruby curled up on the bedroom floor. Her hugs when Ruby got hurt, her sarcasm making Ruby giggle, her presence always near.

 

Blake was like another big sister to her. Ruby had always felt that what Blake and Yang had was different, stronger...special. 

 

“I miss her,” Ruby admits even though it’s probably not the right thing to say, not how you’re supposed to comfort someone. 

 

Yang pulls back, sniffling, violently swiping away the tears on her cheeks. “I don’t.” 

 

It’s a lie; they both know it.

 

“She made her choice.”

 

Ruby didn’t understand why it had become an ultimatum, when it became this or that, them or others, here or gone. “Maybe she’ll come back.”

 

A scoff, an eye roll, Yang is disbelieving, to say the least. “As if I want her to.” There’s a moment after she says it, her eyes shifting to the side, shoulders falling, teeth digging into her lip.

 

“I do,” Ruby says earnestly, sliding her body around so she was next to Yang, arm around her shoulders. “I’d give anything for her to come back.” Ruby lets her head fall to Yang’s shoulders, lets the silence surround them both. “I know you would too.”

 

There are no words in response. Yang presses her face into Ruby’s hair and cries.

 

\--

 

_ 19 _

 

Campus late at night on a weeknight was a different experience. 

 

Sure, there was the occasional kid with a messenger bag over his shoulder, an industrial sized cup of coffee in hand as he stumbled from the library towards his dorm room. Otherwise, they were entirely alone.

 

When Yang’s knuckles had rapped on Blake’s door shortly after one in the morning, she’d been first startled, then concerned, and promptly after that irritated. Yang was radiating energy. It might have been one Red Bull too many, a good grade on a test, a breakthrough on the ideas rolling around in her head. Whatever it was—it made her shine a little bit brighter.

 

Blake couldn’t exactly resist the sun.

 

Before she’d even had a chance to throw on some semblance of proper clothing, Yang was dragging her off; bag slung over her back, Blake’s hand clasped firmly in hers.

 

At this point, they walked in silence. After several, “what the hell are we doings?” and “you’re fucking insanes,” had gotten Blake nowhere. The whole way towards their destination, Yang holds her hand. Like it’s normal.

 

“I have class in the morning you know,” Blake says so she has something else to focus on besides the warmth wrapped up in her grasp and the stirring in her chest. Annoyance could be feigned over this inescapable rush of warmth and desire growing in her. 

 

“Shh,” Yang answers, another urgent tug on her hand. “We only have a few minutes, and you’re complaining is slowing us down.”

 

“A few minutes till wh-” Yang drops her hand when they reach the shitty pond at the edge of campus. It was on an incline meaning one wrong step would send you tumbling towards the duck-piss water below. Blake had been here exactly one other time, and it was no more a sight to behold in the day time than it was at two in the morning. 

 

Yang pulls out a blanket, let’s the air catch beneath it as it settles on the grass unfolded, two hard ciders and bottle opener following after. She sits on the blanket, crosses her legs beneath her and pats the spot next to her with a knowing look to Blake.

 

“This is a breeding ground for mosquitoes, you know.” Yang simply gestures to the open space next to her with a smirk, drink extended. “I really hate you sometimes.”

 

Yang drinks, chugging half the bottle in a matter of seconds. “No, you don’t,” she says easily, and Blake can see every minute movement in her features, capture the exact expression that settles on her face. 

 

Of course, she doesn’t. Of course, Yang knows this. “I will when my 8 AM is starting, and I’m still slugging my way across campus.”

 

“It’ll be worth it,” Yang says, eyes fixed on Blake. There’s about a handful of things Blake can imagine happening at this pond that would be in any way memorable. The first is murder because no one ever comes to this spot easily making it the most secluded. The next is hard drugs, LSD or shrooms or some other crazy trip that is only enhanced by a duck angrily quacking in your face and biting you with its toothless, Mesozoic beak. 

 

The last is the concept that, for some unidentifiable reason, Yang Xiao Long has dragged Blake out of bed at two in the morning to kiss her by one of the most infected bodies of water in all of Vale. 

 

For an extra ounce of bravery, Blake drinks her cider, the crisp apple flavoring sweet and refreshing as she chugs it down. 

 

Yang starts hitting her thigh with urgency, saying, “stop, stop, stop,” and, for the love of god, can she at least finish her drink before she submits to the one thing her entire life has been building to and the only thing in the world that scares her most?

 

But when she looks over at Yang, her eyes are trained on the sky above them, lips parted, eyes wide. Blake’s so in awe of  _ her  _ that she forgets that there might be something else to look at. Yang glances for a second, eyes shifting to her and rolling in exasperation as she grabs Blake’s chin and tilts it towards the sky.

 

“Oh,” she breathes out, the stars alive overhead, burning and bursting and rushing through the air just for them. “Wow.”

 

“You done your bitching now, Belladonna?” Yang teases, her hand falling next to Blake’s on the blanket as she leans back on to them. Their pinkies overlap. 

 

It’s beautiful, breathtaking, stunning in every sense of the word. Blake watches the display overhead with a brief understanding that Yang had dragged her here away from the buildings and street lights so it would be brighter, more brilliant.

 

It’s the most amazing display of nature in action, so far outside her realm of comprehension.

 

Blake deflates ever so slightly, aware of why Yang brought her here now. 

 

“No,” she says, voice wavering.

 

“You are literally impossible to please,” Yang says, eyes still turned upward, the last of her drink drained, set beside the bag to be taken back later. “I bring you to the most amazing private light show as a  _ surprise _ and even purchased you a drink you like to save myself from hearing you complain and you’re telling me that you are still not satisfied?”

 

“Nope,” Blake answers again. The lights overhead are spectacular, but the girl in front of her is a whole other ungodly creation of nature, too beautiful and sincere and perfect for it to be crammed into one human being.

 

“You drive one hell of a bargain, I gotta say. What is it going to take to-”

 

Blake shuts her up as she pushes up onto her knees, getting just enough height that she can lean over Yang, makes sure that she sees her, plain and simple what the intentions are, where she’s going.

 

For once, Yang is quiet. Her lips are parted, breath stalled, waiting.

 

Blake kisses her like the world is ending.

 

It burns around them, a display of majesty and wonder above ignored for what existed directly between.

 

The meteor shower ends. Blake kisses her and kisses her and kisses her until she’s sure the world itself has ceased to move—just for the two of them.

 

\--

 

_ 24 _

 

Ruby’s still up when Yang gets home, legs crossed beneath her on the couch as explosions sound from the television’s speakers. “Hey,” she says, throwing Yang a cursory look before focusing back on the game. “Wanna play?”

 

The offer is casual, a foothold of normal. “Yeah,” she answers, pulling off her boots, shedding her coat. She falls onto the couch and encroaches into Ruby’s space as she connects her scroll and waits for her character to spawn on the screen. “You have school in the morning?”

 

“It’s a Wednesday,” Ruby answers, running past a group of the undead to distract them as Yang starts picking them off with headshots. “My first class isn’t until 10.”

 

Missing several days of classes for a trial that wasn’t hers couldn’t be popular with her professors, but that hadn’t stopped Ruby’s promise to be there. Yang was sure it would be the same next week as well. “Thanks for coming,” she says with her gaze fixed on the screen, her posture tight. 

 

Ruby must look away as a second later her avatar is devoured. “Of course.” The fact that Yang seemed to feel a need to thank her appears to be almost insulting. “Yang, I wouldn’t-”

 

“I know,” Yang cuts her off, shifting. There were people galore on her side, showing up with nothing to offer but support for hours on end of drawn-out court proceedings. “Still appreciate it.”

 

The screen flashes white as Yang is taken out as well; the dark room filled with bright light for a minute. Yang throws her sister a smile, trying to fixate back on the concept of being okay, of making it through this and coming out the other side virtually the same. As if anyone could believe she was the same person she’d been two years ago, five and a half, ten. She’d been rebirthed three times over. This was another instance of being crushed so heavily beneath the pain—there was no chance of recovering those portions of herself. 

 

“How was…” Ruby fades off, feet rubbing against the leather as she changes position. “Does Blake seem good?”

 

It isn’t fair that Yang can’t hear her name without wanting to flinch, can’t see her face without fighting back the desperation to reach out to her, hold onto her. “I don’t know,” she lies. “It’s been two years, Ruby. I feel like I barely even know her.” There are questions where before there had only been answers—now existed gaps in how she understood Blake as a person, how she pieced together the puzzle in front of her. There wasn’t even an outline, more pieces missing then could fit into place.

 

“Liar.” Ruby calls out her sister with ease, voice light when the rest of the world seems heavy. Her fingers move in rapid succession, pulling off some special move and cheering in victory as the mass attack wipes out the enemies on the screen. “You can read her still.”

 

“How would you know,” she bites back, the rhetorics buried in her tone.

 

“Because I can still read her,” Ruby says. “I saw her a couple days before the trial, ran into her at a coffee shop.” Normally Ruby was one to spill every truth. She wasn’t very good at holding things back, keeping her cards close to her chest. “She was still Blake.”

 

Yes, that was the problem. “Different, though.” Like me, Yang thinks, fingers clenching in her right arm out of reflex.

 

“Maybe,” Ruby shrugs, hitting pause and looking to Yang. Didn’t she know this conversation wasn’t one to be had with eye contact? This was the sort of discussion Yang wanted to have in the dark with her mind focused on another task, the person next to her only halfway engaged. “But in the same way that I’m different, or that you are.”

 

Ruby’s hand reaches out, fingers running down the cool, yellow metal of Yang’s arm before reaching for warm flesh. “Sure, things changed, you changed, but not in any way that mattered. Foundationally you’re the same.” The claim resonates as both right and wrong. “You’re still Yang, still my big sister, still stubborn and strong and-”

 

“I am none of that,” Yang fights back, voice finding the emotion she’d been attempting to bury down, words cracking the barrier, wobbling in truth. “She’s taken my heart, my happiness, my literal fucking arm. I am a-a carcass of a human being after she’s done with me, picking at whatever I have like a goddamn turkey vulture.” It’s meant to be nothing but anger and frustration and a whole other plain of pissed-off, but, somewhere along the way, Yang picks up sadness and hurt and misery and finds she can’t put them down again. 

 

“What happened sucks, of course, but once this case is over and Adam’s in jail-”

 

Yang pushes off the couch standing over Ruby, her scroll falling to the floor, eyes flashing red, fire crackling beneath the surface of her skin. “Losing my arm is nothing compared to losing Blake, to her leaving me.”

 

“She was protecting you!” Ruby shouts back, voice loud and determined as she sits below Yang, not relenting even as her sister towers over her. “I know that. You know that. Hell, even Weiss knows that.”

 

“Weiss knows nothing,” Weiss declares from the doorway of her room, clearly having been eavesdropping for some time now. She takes a step back as if to clear out of the line of fire.

 

A bitter laugh combines with tears as Yang looks back to Ruby, head shaking, eyes squeezing shut. “Don’t be childish,” Yang spits out. “She was protecting herself, Ruby. Blake couldn’t deal with facing the guilt of what happened to me. She couldn’t look at me every day with an arm missing and not drown in her own self-loathing. So she ran the fuck away where she didn’t have to deal.”

 

“That’s not true,” Ruby shoots back, losing her vigor. She shrinks in her resilience, tiny in Yang’s shadow.

 

“You don’t know her like I do,” Yang argues, voice lower, arms falling to her side. The flames begin to settle. “I know exactly how this story ends even though it’s only beginning.” Yang’s head drops as she bends to pick her scroll up from the floor, turning towards her room. “I’m just cutting out the middle part.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I swear, this angst does let up eventually. Also, feel free to follow me on tumblr if anyone is interested: https://www.tumblr.com/blog/qualiteablogger I'm not the most active but I'm looking for more RWBY blogs to follow so send me a hello if you want! Again, I appreciate all the feedback! Have a great weekend :)


	5. Chapter 5

_ 21 _

 

Ruby sleeps on the small window seat in Yang’s hospital room for three nights in a row. 

 

On the fourth, the nurses kick her out. 

 

“Go home,” Yang says, as Ruby stalls standing in front of the hospital bed rambling on about the oil change her car needs. “I’ll change your oil when I get out of here.”

 

Ruby doesn’t mean to, but instinct draws her eyes to the bandages wrapped around Yang’s arm. Or, more accurately, where it had been. It kills her that the first question coming to mind is,  _ how? _ “Call me if you change your mind,” Ruby offers, kicking her dad’s foot that was stretched in front of him, body leaning over onto Yang’s bed as he slept. “Come on, Dad. Yang’s kicking us out ‘cause you snore too loud.”

 

There’s a hesitation, but he holds Yang’s eyes for a moment, acknowledges her firm nod and then gets up, pressing a kiss into her hair. “Love you, firecracker.”

 

“Love you too.”

 

In the car, Ruby is restless. She drives, her right foot pressing on the gas and her left tapping next to her. The future felt uncertain in the matter of a twenty-second call. There were questions rolling around that Ruby had never needed to acknowledge before. Above all, she wanted to know the hows of what happened, not just the result. 

 

At home she torments herself, flipping back and forth in bed, closing her eyes and seeing Yang rolling through the ambulance bay doors, blood dripping to the tiled floor. Blake coming in behind her with a hand pressed against her side, calling out Yang’s name as they wheeled her into a trauma room. 

 

They’d been separated in the emergency room, and that felt like the biggest mistake those doctors could have made, but then Yang is rushed into surgery and Ruby is escorted to the waiting room where she has to call her dad and try and explain what happened while Weiss sits tensely behind her, hands folded in her lap. The moment Ruby falls next to her again, scroll dropping to the table, Weiss wraps an arm around her shoulders. 

 

It’s a cautious hand, just barely pressing any contact, but steadily there. “What do you think happened?” Weiss asks after another hour of silence.

 

“Hell if I know.”

 

Now, any second that isn’t spent with her eyes trained on her big sister makes Ruby feel like she’s back in that room. Like she will never get out. Like she will never find answers.

 

Hours later she was in the ICU alone. Weiss wasn’t allowed in; their dad was still on his way.

 

Yang was mostly unconscious, letting out little groans of pain every so often. Ruby would hit the lit up green button for pain medicine whenever she did, even though she wasn’t allowed to be the one to touch it, someone had to do it for her. 

 

Once Yang has been verified alive and out of the woods, Ruby texts Blake to make sure she knows this fact. There’s no response. Ruby asks if she’s okay. Nothing.

 

Convinced that Blake’s dead in the ER, Ruby leaves her sister’s bedside to go downstairs and check on her.

 

“She left several hours ago,” the receptionist says, eyebrows narrowing as she stared at the computer screen. “Signed out AMA it says.”

 

“AMA?”   
  


“Against medical advice.”

 

So she’s gone. Somewhere, but not where she should be, not with Yang.

 

Ruby doesn’t attempt to contact Blake again, instead holding vigil at her sister’s bedside, asking questions about her care. In those few hours when it was Ruby and no one else, she demands answers of what this all means in the long term, writing down information whenever they offer it. 

 

The blankets are tight around her in her bed tonight.  They’re like a manacle. She throws them off, feet touching the cold hardwood, flinching away before she stands, pacing back and forth. Her scroll sits on her dresser, plugged in to charge.

 

She picks it up, dials Blake’s contact without thinking about it. It goes to voicemail.

 

“Where are you?” Ruby demands as soon as she hears the beep. “What’s going on?” She doesn’t mean for a hiccup of a sob to take over her, but it does. “Yang’s in the ICU missing her arm and you’re just gone, Blake. Why did you leave? She needs you!” Ruby cries, feeling the loss her sister is going through in only fraction, but experiencing through visceral aches, in her bones, in her chest, in her head like a searing pain. “You can’t leave her again, Blake. You broke her the first time. Don’t do this again. Please.”

 

She hangs up the call and cries with a hand pressed against her mouth to stifle the sobs, body slumped against a wall, sliding down to meet the floor.

 

All she knows is sadness and loss and questions that have no answers until warm arms wrap around her, holding her for several minutes before picking her up like she was still a child, depositing her on the couch. 

 

They sleep in the living room every night until Yang comes home. 

 

Her dad never cries.

 

Ruby doesn’t stop.

 

\--

 

_ 24 _

 

Sun sits on the couch with Blake until two in the morning. They eat cereal for dinner and watch reruns of shitty comedies until they bleed into infomercials for spinning mop heads. 

 

“She’ll never forgive me,” Blake says, a blanket to her chin, head on the armrest. Sun doesn’t say anything, letting the claim fill the room until Blake has to relieve the pressure. “For leaving her like I did. She’ll hate me forever.”

 

His foot on the coffee table points and relaxes as he waits to see if she adds on anything else. “Is that what you believe?” he pushes, turning the volume down as the announcer’s voice grows in enthusiasm. “Or is that what you hope?”

 

Blake wants to call a foul on his question. Out of bounds, she declares mentally. “You haven’t seen the way she looks at me.” It’s a new kind of hate. Blake has had more than enough angry, hate-filled looks shot her way through the years. This is something else entirely. Equal parts hatred and misery and disappointment all combined, all buried in the same eyes that used to hold nothing but love and softness and desire. Lilac was never meant to be this violent. 

 

“Oh, I have,” Sun says with a breath of a laugh. “That whole courtroom has seen how you two look at each other.” 

 

The guilt, the hatred, the tension—it was there for everyone to join in on, apparently, a history coming to life without any of the contexts to go along with it. “Great.”

 

“Blake,” he says her name with his own degree of tenderness, of warmth. Different, though, still nice, but nothing like how Yang holds her name. His hand falls to her ankle where it rests next to him, squeezes once before pulling away. “She loves you still. Whether or not she wants to, there’s no denying the fact that Yang loves you regardless.” He gets up, hands stretching above his head. “I’m going to bed.”

 

When he’s gone, she curls into herself, chin to chest, ears flattening into her hair. The relief fills her too fast before the disappointment, the fear, can color in. The guilt filters its way through as she clings to her scroll and thinks of calling her just to hear her name held that way again. 

 

It’s not fair, is all the reminder she needs. The suffering she’s caused was her own creation. At the very least she should be made to live within it.

 

\--

 

_ 18 _

 

Winter break their first year finds Ruby attached to Yang’s hip. She follows her everywhere. The first two nights she even climbs into bed with her on the guise of talking before passing out twenty minutes later, her body heat pressed against Yang’s side.

 

“She’s like a puppy,” Yang whispers to Blake while Ruby’s in the kitchen for half a second. “I’ve never seen her like this before.”

 

Blake shrugs, setting her scroll down as she looks to Yang. “She missed you,” she says plainly. “I can understand that.”

 

Yang feels the implication, bites back asking any questions. “I’m going to have to come back to second semester with my little sister on my arm.”

 

“Yep!” Ruby says with a tone of pride, setting a tray of drinks and cookies down. “Dad’s company is good for like, two nights tops. I can’t let you leave again.”

 

Blake takes a bite of a cookie and passes it off to Yang. “Or,” Yang says around a bite, “you could go hang out with some  _ friends _ .”

 

“Gross.” Ruby falls dramatically across the armchair perpendicular to them. “Going outside? Getting dressed? Talking to people? You’ve just described my worst nightmare.”

 

“Worse than watching Jeopardy with Dad every single night?”

 

“Hey now,” he says, coming down the stairs, ruffling Yang’s hair as he walks by, “on weekends we watch Dateline.”

 

The loud gunshots of the video game fill the living room again as Ruby unpauses the screen. “Take me with you,” she says in a stage whisper with pleading eyes.

 

Blake’s feet dig their way under Yang’s thigh, ignoring her indignant, “Hey!” in response. 

 

“My feet are cold,” Blake whines. “And you’re a campfire.”

 

“Yang’s a whole forest fire,” Ruby corrects. “You should feel her when she falls asleep. I’ve woken up two nights in a row covered in sweat.”

 

“Maybe if you stopped nudging your way into my bed…” Yang trails off, connecting her scroll with the screen and spawning in the game. “Besides, Blake freezes when she sleeps. I prevent hypothermia from setting in.” 

 

Blake blushes, connecting her own scroll and joining in on the game, surprising them both. 

 

“Don’t you room with Weiss?” Ruby asks a minute later. 

 

“Hence why Blake and I share a bed,” Yang says, playing it off as casual, ignoring the heat in her face, on the back of her neck, collecting in her palms. 

 

“Uh-huh,” Ruby eyes them both for a minute, missing Yang’s avatar coming around the corner and delivering a close-up headshot, blood and guts exploding as the ‘game over’ flashes on Ruby’s corner of the screen. “Dammit!”

 

“Get some friends, Ruby,” Yang says, throwing her scroll down on the couch and walking out of the room before anyone can respond.

 

Don’t mention the fact that you still share a bed at eighteen; Yang reminds herself. And maybe don’t admit the fact that you live in the same building already. 

 

\--

 

_ 24 _

 

Wednesday morning Yang is the first one to arrive at the drafty law office where Weiss had arranged a conference room for Ironwood and them to meet. She drops her bag to the ground, laying her head in her arms on the shiny, reflective hardwood table. 

 

Sleep had been more of a concept last night. Blake’s  _ I do _ stuck in Yang’s head on repeat. The thought made her stomach swirl with anxiety of what exactly that meant for her, for them. It was bad enough that they had to sit in that stand and lay out the horrors they’d gone through that night. How was it possible that giving a detailed report of the severing of her right arm not enough?

 

The doorknob twists, the hinges emitting a quiet squeak as it opens halfway, Blake slipping through. She freezes when she spots just Yang sitting there—like Yang was to determine whether or not Blake was free to enter. She spans an arm out, “Pick a chair.”

 

Blake’s eyes shift, the door falling shut behind her as she makes her way around the table, picking the next to farthest seat away from Yang. She hangs her purse off the back of her chair, leaves her coat on. “It’s pretty cold still,” Blake comments, a cup of tea clenched tight in her hand. 

 

Yang fights a physical wince in response to the small talk. It was more unfamiliar than the shift in Blake’s features, the new habit of scanning eyes that she’d picked up, the nails that had been picked down to the skin. 

 

Never before had they been small talk people with each other. You don’t have small talk with the person who lived in this world just for you, the person who knew you walked in a room by the change in the air. 

 

Small talk wasn’t for soulmates.

 

“Yep,” Yang answers, eyes falling back to her scroll where she skimmed posts without purpose. Every part of her fights to feign nonchalance, like Blake’s mere presence hasn’t unsettled something within Yang, like she wasn’t desperate to recover distance, to heal wounds, to be a whole person again. “I think it’s supposed to snow tomorrow…” she trails off, nothing more to add.

 

Their eyes meet, and the oxygen from the room burns away in an instant, leaving them breathless, clinging to the air that remained in their lungs before they were left with nothing. The shared look is all it takes to uproot Yang from this moment in front of her, instead transported back to her body pressed into the snow, a faceful of slush forced into her face by a thickly mittened hand. The laughter rings in her ears, the pressure against her lips a distant memory, a dream ripped away. 

 

When her eyes pan back up to Blake, a ragged breath drawn in as the fire within releases oxygen for them to grasp onto, she knows the memory isn’t dragging her down alone. Yang’s hand clenches into a fist around nothing. “Don’t forget a hat,” she murmurs and Blake’s face cracks, her mouth opening to respond.

 

Only a, “Yang,” manages to slip out before the door opens again, Ironwood shuffling in with a box and an armload of papers.

 

They get to work; all mentions of that past forgotten in favor of memories that hurt in a different way. Yang can’t quite decide what tears her open more—the dull stabbing follows her all the way home that night. It never quite cuts her through, never sets her free.

 

The snow starts just before she climbs the stairs to her building and she stalls, caught in the flurry of white flakes beginning to fall from the sky. She’s pretty sure she knows the answer.

 

\--

 

_ 19 _

 

Despite the ongoing weather reports of heavy, persistent snowfall starting in the early morning and continuing late into the evening, the university hadn’t bothered to cancel classes. Not until the whole campus had settled into their morning classes, to-go mugs filled with coffee next to them and snow boots tied to their feet. Blake’s eight thirty psychology class has only been in session for five minutes when phones start going off, alerts of school closures filling their screens. Class is promptly dismissed.

 

Blake takes her time shoving her books in her bag, chatting with Nora for a minute, and relayering herself heavily, hat pulled over both sets of ears, scarf up high around her neck, coat zipped up to her chin.

 

The second she’s out the front door, Yang is falling into step beside her. “Hey,” Blake says, smiling despite the rush of snowflakes blowing against her eyes, and the crunch of already settled snow beneath her boots. It was a few inches deep, each step requiring a little more effort than usual. “Wanna study at my place?” she offers, knowing the alternative is that they will study at Yang’s instead.

 

“Are you suggesting there was any other option?” Yang asks, feigning confusion with a shake of her head. “I didn’t realize we still considered solo activities a possibility these days.”

 

Blake shoves her shoulder lightly, laughing as Yang bumps back against her, her arm falling around Blake’s shoulders and drawing her closer. Yang’s coat is hanging wide open, only thin gloves on her hands and her hair loose and flying every which way in the wind. She should be freezing, but Blake presses herself closer to absorb some of Yang’s body heat. “I think you’re a medical marvel,” she comments as she fits herself against Yang’s side, nose tucking against the material of her shirt. 

 

“Hm,” Yang muses, tongue darting out to lick a snowflake that lands on her lip. “Is that a compliment or not? I really can’t tell.”

 

“Definitely not,” Blake jokes. “You’re fucking weird, as we’ve always known.”

 

Yang gasps dramatically, causing Blake to giggle against her. “Wow, Blake, cutting me deep here.” The humor dies instantaneously, as Yang pinches the top of Blake’s hat, pulling it from the top of her head and waving it in her direction as she steps away. “One day you’ll learn not to be so  _ mean  _ to me,” she says with a hand to her chest. “Terrorizing your girlfriend without a single regard for her feelings.”

 

The shivering starts immediately, both from the loss of her hat and the loss of the heat box she’d been wrapped around. “Okay, I take it back,” she says, holding her hand out.

 

“Too late!” Yang declares, fighting back her laughter as she steps out of Blake’s reach, holding the hat in the air. “You’ve already wrecked me!” she flings her other hand over her face, throwing her head back with a makeshift sob. 

 

The other pedestrians are looking at them as Yang only gains volume. “Okay, babe, you’re hilarious, really,” she launches herself towards her hat a second time. “But now I’m cold, and you’re making a scene... _ again _ .” This was about a once weekly occurrence. Probably half the campus knew them as the dramatic lesbians. 

 

“You should’ve of thought of that before breaking my heart,” she says, the look in her eyes growing more mischievous. Blake can see the trouble flashing even through the thick, fat snowflakes falling from the sky which were now landing amongst her hair and ears thanks to someone. “How dare you hurt me this way, Belladonna!” Yang starts taking steps backward on the sidewalk, away from Blake. “You will have no choice but to prove your love for me once more. Until then, I only hope you can feel pain as I have!”

 

And then she’s fucking running, hand tightening around Blake’s purple beanie as she takes off down the snow covered sidewalk, dodging other students. Blake only waits half a second before taking off after her, knowing the longer she waited, the harder it would be to catch up.

 

Her boots are heavy on her feet, sinking into the three-inch deep snow with every step and forcing her to pull her boot free from the wet, slushy snow. Even though she’s still several feet behind her, it’d be impossible for Blake to miss Yang’s laughter as she darts around students, looking over her shoulder and sticking her tongue out in Blake’s direction. 

 

That’s it. Blake throws an extra burst of speed into her jog, catching up to Yang and grabbing her coat in a fistful, wrenching her around to face her. Their feet slip out from beneath them, and Yang hits a snowbank back first, raucous laughter ringing out loud enough for the campus to hear as Blake takes a handful of snow and shoves it in her face, knees falling on to either side of Yang’s body. “Asshole,” Blake declares as she pulls her hat free and drags it back over her freezing ears. “I hate you.”

 

Yang’s still laughing as she sputters the snow away from her face, hands wiping it off of her forehead. “You’re trying to murder me!” she yells, tears spilling from her eyes along with her laughter. “Jesus, Belladonna, hypothermia is setting in.”

 

Blake goes to get up, knees fully saturated from propping herself over top of Yang, but a hand drags her back down before she gets far. “You can’t leave me in this condition!”

 

“In the snow?” Blake asks, eyebrow raising. “Yeah, sure. Get up.”

 

“I’m getting frostbite in my lips. I need a way to warm them immediately before amputation is necessary.”

 

For fuck’s sake. “Pretty sure frostbite in lips isn’t a thing, babe. Or amputation...”

 

“Are you a medical doctor?” Yang demands, eyebrows rising. “I think not.” Blake glares down at her, knees and calves thoroughly freezing as the water seeps through her leggings. But Yang’s lying beneath her with her smile wide, flecks of white snow collecting against her bright yellow hair. “You attack me and then refuse to help pick up the pieces!” she yells, their fellow students, oh and there’s Professor Port, glancing to them as they go by. “Uncaring of what consequences I suffer!”

 

“If your lips were getting frostbite you wouldn’t be able to talk.”

 

“It’s setting in,” Yang says, voice falling several decibels as she reaches a hand out into empty space. “The light is coming for me.”

 

In an effort to make this stop and allow her the chance to get out of the snow pile, Blake leans in, firmly pressing her lips against Yang’s. They’re still plenty warm. She pulls away. “Happy?” she asks, looming over her, eyes holding Yang’s before dropping down to her lips. 

 

“Sensation...returning. Life...continuing.” Blake rolls her eyes, moving to get up. “Wait, one more for good measure.” She gives in. What’s the point of fighting her off by now?

 

As soon as Blake stands, Yang pops up beside her. She’s still giggling as she pulls clumps of snow out of her hair, swipes it off the arms of her jacket. “You are your own worst enemy,” Blake comments, shivering as the wind picks up, the cold air digging the wet splotches on her pants into her skin. “Probably mine too.”

 

Yang throws her arm around Blake, places a sloppy kiss to her cheek. “Love you too, baby,” she answers, grabbing Blake’s hand and pulling her in the direction of their dorm. Blake follows, whispering in Yang’s a few ways she can help warm her up.

 

\--

 

_ 24 _

 

Weiss didn’t exactly choose sides when everything happened their senior year. She wasn’t one to choose sides, necessarily. Blake took off, vanished in the night like a shadow, a falling star burning out before anyone could catch where she was going. Yang was there. 

 

So she didn’t choose a side; it was all circumstantial really.

 

Growing up she’d had friends, she’d had her family, but college was a whole new experience. She meets Yang during the tour around the campus, rolls her eyes at how brusque and loud and disrespectful she is. At least, she’s rolling her eyes until she hears Yang’s comments under her breath and then Weiss is clutching her stomach as she laughs. Honesty had never been a big thing in her life. Yang is painfully honest. 

 

Blake became another fixated piece of Weiss’ life, appearing with Yang on the first day of college and never leaving. Blake was funny in her own way, quiet but opinionated. The first time they meet, Blake’s ears perk up at the mention of Weiss’ last name, and she’s dark, angry, rude. Weiss knows exactly why and decides she likes Blake just fine. They spend the next four years mutually hating her father and growing closer for it. 

 

The friends she made in college were so much more than her friends from before. They were greater than the family she grew up around. She loved them because she wanted to. They returned the favor in her direction. They fought and got on each other’s nerves and sharing a room with Ruby in their apartment was a  _ terrible  _ idea, but she’s never been happier, never known affection like she feels with them.

 

When Weiss’s parents separated while remaining together, her side had been chosen for her. Mom was drunk or high or asleep. Dad was in a meeting or a different country or a hotel. She chose no one’s side.

 

Blake and Yang...they were different.

 

It’s been two years, and Weiss knows losing Blake has impacted her personally the least. No one has to tell her this, but seeing Blake for the first time in that courtroom, dressed in business clothes with a newly determined set to her shoulders, Weiss swears she could cry. She’s lost a lot of family in her life. She didn’t think she’d be losing the one she had chosen as well. 

 

“Ruby,” Weiss whispers after that first day in the courtroom. They’d settled into bed only five minutes ago, and Ruby’s breaths have already evened out, her face smushed in her pillow. Weiss chucks the first thing her hand finds in Ruby’s direction, which just so happens to be one of her BAR study books. 

 

“Ow!” Oops.

 

“You fell asleep too fast,” Weiss accuses, like this was all on Ruby. “I need to talk to you.”

 

Ruby’s still rubbing at her arm as she pushes herself up, pillow on her lap. “Weiss Schnee wants to have a heart to heart?” she asks, hand to her forehead. “I must’ve taken too much cold medicine again.”

 

“Shut up,” Weiss rolls her eyes. “You and Yang are so annoyingly similar. I had an actual question.”

 

“Okay, okay, I am a cesspool of information.”

 

“Gross, wrong analogy” Weiss gags. “Do you think Yang would be upset if I met up with Blake? Like for dinner or something?”

 

“Oh, of course not,” Ruby answers immediately. “She wouldn’t want to come between yours and Blake’s friendship.”

 

Weiss feels a wave of sadness; this was never how things were supposed to go. She wasn’t supposed to be getting ready to finish graduate school and take her boards and wondering who she should invite to her graduation party. Not every realm of her life was supposed to include tip toeing over eggshells.

 

Slipping off her bed, she comes to sit beside Ruby, pressing her back to the wall as her legs stretch in front of her, toes pointing and flexing like when she was a kid in ballet class. “I hate this. It’s been two years, and it just...it sucks.”

 

Ruby’s head falls to Weiss’s shoulder as she heaves a sigh. “I know,” she whispers. “Sometimes I wonder which time is worse, what hurts more to watch.” Weiss can tell Ruby is crying. She always started crying when they talked about this stuff. “I just want them to be happy.”

 

It’s an innocent request, pure and simplistic in the way life never quite works out. “I don’t know if that’s possible when they’re apart from each other,” Weiss admits quietly, trying not to compare and contrast her first four years of friendship with them followed by the most recent two. 

 

“I know it’s not,” Ruby says with a sniff. “With anyone else I would say they would move on, rebuild themselves separately, all that self-love and shit.” She pushes herself away, runs a hand down her face. “But I’ve been here before, Weiss. And the years, they don’t do anything to help them. Not being together...it drains more of who they are than being together.”

 

“Like they need each other?” Weiss asks, never having believed in such a concept, that one person could be truly reliant on the other.

  
“No,” Ruby says quietly, curling on her side and putting her head on her pillow. “Like they’re apart of each other.”

 

It was something Weiss had never before considered. As soon as Ruby says it, though, she’s convinced she’s never heard anything more right in her life.

 

\--

 

_ 16 _

 

The next time Sun finds Blake, they’re on a mission. They are the background portion of an ambush, the distraction to crack twigs beneath their feet, shake the leaves in the trees. Anything to get the guards looking in the wrong direction. 

 

Her fingers snap a stick, the loud crack breaking the air around them. Sun’s got his tale wrapped around a branch, hanging upside down as he shifts his weight. When she goes to walk by him, he flips around, jumping down in front of her.

 

In a flash, his hands are grabbing her shoulders, backing her further into the forest and behind a large tree trunk. Her heart goes to her throat as she reaches for the blade strapped to her back. 

 

“Hey, hey, stop,” he whispers fervently, hands releasing her and being held up in surrender. “I just want to talk.”

 

Her eyes narrow. “People don’t normally have casual conversations by hiding behind trees,” she comments, the tension leaving the muscles of her back and swirling down to her stomach as she hears flesh being severed through below, flinching at the singular cry of anguish that quiets too soon.

 

“I wanted to talk where no one else was listening,” he says, leaning towards her ear. “I’m not supposed to tell you this.”

 

“Then don’t,” she cuts him off, taking a step back. His lips shouldn’t be that close to her skin, the imprint of his hands is burning into the flesh of her shoulders. There would be trouble if someone were to find Sun’s scent buried in her clothes, find the guilt tucked into her cells. 

 

Sun glances over his shoulder, as if he senses the same threat Blake feels within her veins. “I’m not really joining you guys,” he says in a rush. “I’m doing this project for my thesis, and it got like, way out of hand, and I’ll probably be in massive trouble, but I started uncovering stuff, and I had to see for myself, you know?”

 

Her eyes widen, lips loosening. “You mean you’re…”

 

“Faking it? Yeah, totally,” he says this with an air of nonchalance. Clearly, he has not yet grasped what it means to be apart of the White Fang or the implications it has to join Adam’s sector above all else. “I knew there was something dirty going on. I could smell the shit from miles away. But I wanted to kinda get a feel for things for myself, you know? Didn’t want to judge something I wasn’t ever apart of.”   
  


“You need to go,” Blake says in hushed, hurried tones, her worry for this boy she doesn’t even know mounting. He was so innocent, and here he was aiding and abetting in  _ murder  _ just beneath them. “Before anyone finds out. Before Adam…” She trails off. If Sun doesn’t leave now, take off in the middle of an ambush, that means every second she holds this secret is another second she’s betraying Adam. It was another moment of deception spent protecting someone she hardly knows in favor of assisting the love of her life. “You have to leave.”

 

He nods. “Duh, I’ve kinda figured that one out, Blake.” He rolls his eyes, not grasping the gravity of this situation, not realizing the sort of danger he’s in. “But I’ve seen you around camp and how that Adam guy treats you...it’s weird. Come with me.”

 

The world beside her vanishes, a gaping hole left in its place. Leaving was not an option. She couldn’t just...abandon their mission, everything they had worked towards. She couldn’t betray Adam like that. “I can’t.” Which is the wrong answer. The answer should be  _ I don’t want to. This is where I belong. These are my people.  _ The words that slip out only define obligation.

 

“Yes, you can!” He’s urgent now, a new found fervor in his voice, words quicker. “Blake, I know I’ve only been here, like, a few days, but I can tell you’re miserable. You hate what’s going on here.”

 

The truth stings sharper, deeper than the lie she’s living within. “I stand by the core of the White Fang.” The words are dull, lifeless. She can’t even convince herself when freedom is standing in front of her. 

 

“But you’re standing with the subgroup, the extremists,” he argues. “Listen, I’m nosy; I’ve been asking around about you.”

 

“You shouldn’t do that,” she interrupts, tone warning. 

 

“Whatever,” he dismisses her concerns like they’re nothing, like the words don’t hold a promise and a threat of what’s to come. “I know you haven’t always been apart of this. That your parents left. Don’t you miss them?”

 

The question is a punch to the gut. She misses them every day. She misses them when the nightmares roll in, even more when the nightmares are her reality. “It doesn’t matter.”

 

“I know there are people out there who care about you,” he says this like an accusation. “And I know that  _ you  _ care about  _ them _ . You have family, friends, right?”

 

Those words are a slap to the face. Yes, she has friends. Ones who she abandoned, betrayed, said whatever needed to be said to let her to disappear, to hate her. The very mention of friends makes Yang’s image float through Blake’s mind, bright yellow hair and a vibrant smile soaking up the space, absorbing all of the neurons to be entirely dedicated to focusing on her. 

 

“Yes,” she whispers without meaning to answer. She broke Yang’s heart, could hear the snap and the tear right through her scroll, could imagine the welling of tears in her eyes, the quiver of her lip. 

 

Sun sees her weakness for what it is and descends. “They miss you too, I bet. They would want you to come home.”

 

If only he knew. If only he could imagine. “No,” she says, voice clouded over with darkness, enshrouded in determination. 

 

“Blake-”

 

“That’s enough,” she says with a sharp edge. “If you’re done collecting your intel then I suggest you get the hell out.”

 

“But-”

 

“Don’t think I won’t reveal you for what you are.” She threatens this with a glare, standing up to her full height that still left her so small. She was the villain, the threat. He would think of her that way. It would get him out. “Don’t doubt I’ll tell Adam the truth.” It would keep her safe.

 

There’s still a voice ringing through her ears as she turns away, walks through the trees and fallen leaves, avoiding stepping on a thing until she’s back where she’s supposed to be, where Adam will have been waiting for her. She steps on dried up leaves that crunch beneath her boots, walks through brush that scratches her legs through her tights. There would be no doubt in anyone’s mind exactly where she was.

 

She locks eyes with Adam from atop the cliff where she stands, holding his gaze as it finds her. When he turns away she looks over her shoulder, checks to make sure Sun followed her advice. Looking back all she sees is the bodies on the ground, a white mask, and a blood-soaked blade.

 

\--

 

_ 24 _

 

“Character witnesses,” Ironwood starts the next day, already mid-conversation with Yang before Blake walks in. “The more we can get in offense to Adam the better.”

 

“I can name a few,” Blake mumbles as she falls into the seat next to Yang instead of bothering to make her way around the entire table. The rest of the previous day, she’d regretted her decision, awkwardly aware of how Ironwood had to keep twisting to look at them both, unable to help but look to Yang when she was practically sitting across from her. Next to was easier. 

 

Ironwood looks surprised to find Blake offering actual help for once. “Oh?” he asks, attention shifted away from Yang. Yang looks over her shoulder, eyes meeting Blake’s before glancing away, staring down at her scroll that was dark. 

 

Blake forces her gaze away. “Yeah, I mean, I was in the White Fang after all,” she says as an obvious reminder. “Ilia would be willing to testify I’m sure. And my friend Sun, he was kind of apart of it for a little bit, did a whole research project. He’s been at the proceedings so far anyway.”

 

Nodding in excitement, Ironwood scribbles down notes. “That’s good, Blake. Anything else I should know about them? Any portion of your relationship that could be called into question by Adam’s attorney?”

 

Blake bites her lip, the implication making her uncomfortable when she was so close to Yang. One leg crosses over the other as she situates in her chair. “Just friends,” she states with certainty. Yang’s shoulders loosen with the words. “I stayed with Sun for a little bit a couple of years ago when he was in Vacuo. He’s moved to Vale since then so I’m crashing on his couch again. But just...just as friends.” 

 

“And you, Ms. Xiao Long?”

 

Yang looks up from the table, looking to her right where Blake was before her head swished to her left where Ironwood sat at the head of the table. “Me?” she asks, finger pointing to her chest. “No, no,” she’s shaking her head, hands up in surrender. “I don’t have character witnesses against Adam. I don’t have character witnesses.” She sits back in her chair, arms folding over her chest.

 

Ironwood sighs, fingers digging into the bridge of his nose. “Why are you stubborn over the strangest things?” he asks in a heavy voice. “The charge of long-term pain and suffering is being called into question-”

 

“Wrongfully.”

 

“And I really believe adding someone to the stand on your behalf would make a difference.”

 

“Fine,” Yang says, sitting forward, arms in the air. “Do you want to put my sister up there? Or maybe Weiss Schnee, you know, your employer? Real solid options to a courtroom I’m sure.” she stares back at Ironwood’s glare with determination. “I don’t have anyone to put on the stand, okay?” She looks to Blake before pushing her chair back, wood scraping. 

 

Blake casts her eyes down, looking at her clenched hands in her lap as they continue to bicker. 

 

“What about a doctor?” Ironwood suggests. “Physical therapist? Whoever helped create your prosthetic?” he throws out options with a wavering of confidence in his tone.

 

Yang stands facing a wall, giving a grunt of frustration. “I don’t have anyone to offer, okay?” she says, shoulders dropping. “I don’t exactly advertise my ‘long-term pain and suffering.’”

 

“Except on the stand,” Ironwood corrects, taking a piece of paper and a pencil and setting them where Yang had been sitting. “Write out a statement, be your own character witness. I’ll direct the questioning.”

 

Yang’s glare goes from the blank piece of paper to Blake who stares back with eyes wide, biting her lip. Vulnerability had never been Yang’s strong suit, not even when they were kids. She was fists and fire, strength reincarnated into a human being, protective to a fault. Putting her pain out into the world, playing up to people’s pitying nature, it was against Yang’s instincts. 

 

She falls back into her seat, hair brushing against Blake’s shoulder as she sits. It’s not much, but it’s enough to make Blake pause, all at once enraptured with the memory of laying together in bed, fingers curled in tangled strands, facefuls of bright yellow in the middle of the night, first thing in the morning—the smell of citrus and early morning fires. 

 

“Fine,” Yang says, picking up her pencil and tapping the end of the eraser on the paper. “I’ll work on it tonight.” She turns to Blake, offering up half a smile. “You got the easy way out, Belladonna.”

 

Not fair, not fair, not fair. Yang’s mouth still holds her name the same way, still sends her stomach swooping, her heart racing, the ground itself falling out from beneath her as her vision fixates on Yang’s lips, the place where Blake’s name fits so perfectly, was held so lovingly. 

 

“I don’t think this is easy for any of us,” she whispers in response, tearing her eyes away. She can feel Yang’s double meaning, like a stabbing between the ribs, dull and resonating through her skeleton. “I think we’re all in hell.”  _ And I’m the one that put us here.  _

 

“Someone tell the weather that,” Yang deadpans, her lips flashing up in the briefest of smiles. 

 

Blake releases a laugh in a breath, caught off guard while the relief settles into her skin. Some semblance of normal, reaching out like an olive branch. “Double hell.” Blake amends, grasping tightly in an attempt to hold on.

 

“Now you’re getting it.”

 

\--

 

_ 21 _

 

Yang goes back to school two and a half weeks after the “accident.” 

 

Word had already spread around that two girls had been accosted, damage doled out. Some said they’d been murdered, others raped. No one quite guessed right that Yang, the loud-mouthed, over-confident senior would be returning to school without her right arm.

 

“Ignore them,” Weiss says as a group of young girls  stop their conversation to stare as Yang walks by, the wound still wrapped with gauze. She tried to make a point to wear sleeves longer than the stub.

 

Instead of ignoring them Yang glares. “Can I help you?” she asks, voice drawling.  They turn red, look away. “I’m not a fucking zoo exhibit.”

 

“That wasn’t quite the ‘ignore them’ approach I was advising,” Weiss mutters even though Yang can clearly understand her. 

 

“Too fucking bad,” Yang says, words biting. It’d be so easy if Weiss would pick a fight with her, the most natural thing in the world to scream and yell and let her hair flame and her eyes turn red as the anger seeped through her pores, tore from her mouth, exuded from her eyes. Being angry—viscerally, unabashedly angry—was all Yang had going for her right about now.

 

Weiss defies the temptation, walks with an increase of speed to her step, her nose up in the air to make sure Yang was well aware she would not be stooping to her levels. “You can be pissed off at the world and your girlfriend and the asshole who cut off your arm all you want,” Weiss says, words even and steadied, “but I am not about to let you turn away everyone in your life. Do you understand me?”

 

She doesn’t have to turn a single person away. They all leave of their own accord.

 

“Yes, Weiss. I understand.”

 

\--

 

_ 13 _

 

The summer air is warm, tinged with humidity. The stars hang in the clear sky overhead, their feet slipping on the damp grass beneath them. The two of them run with abandon out to the soccer goal. Blake and Yang each take a side, tipping it on it’s back and tripping into the net. Yang throws herself up and over, her body flying into the air for a second before settling back down.

 

Blake climbs in beside her, hands and knees swinging along with the swaying net before she falls to her side, giggling in Yang’s ear.

 

“My parents would be so mad,” Blake whispers, like they could still hear her out in the middle school field. 

 

Yang taps the end of Blake’s nose before fixing her eyes back to the stars overhead. “That’s why we aren’t going to tell them my dad is away this week.” A simple solution. Yang wasn’t above keeping secrets.

 

Constellations fall into place easily, the dots connected naturally, creating shapes and images, some of them real and, probably, some of them not. Blake points above her, index finger tracing the sky. “I guess, it’s the least they owe us,” Blake sighs, the sadness welling up in her even as she tries to trample it down.

 

“None of that,” Yang argues, flicking the side of Blake’s face. “We are here for fun only tonight, Belladonna.”

 

“Why do you always call me that?” Blake asks. The question trips out, stumbles over her tongue, past her lips. 

 

“You call  _ me  _ Xiao Long,” Yang says. An imposter of an answer. 

 

“Because you call me Belladonna,” Blake answers. A simple “hm” in response. She reaches out a bony elbow, pressing it into Yang’s side. “Out with it.”

 

Laughing, she pushes Blake away, hands wrapping around her upper arms, holding there for a second too long. “It’s a nice last name.”

 

“Is Blake not a nice first name?” she challenges, leaning over Yang, eyebrow raised dramatically.

 

More laughing. Blake wishes she could stuff that sound in the back of their moving truck. Forget all about the furniture and clothes and other useless items. She needed Yang’s laughter to follow her out to the island, to warm her against the breeze, to hold her within the loneliness. 

 

“It’s a great name. Just…” Yang trails off, biting her bottom lip. Blake still hovers above her, and for a second all Blake can see are Yang’s lips, all she can remember is how they felt pressed against her own, how it was supposed to be wrong but it wasn’t. It wasn’t even close to that end of the spectrum. “Well, ever since you told me what it means I’ve liked it a little more.”

 

“Deadly nightshade?” Blake asks, her voice rising in octaves as her nose scrunches up. “You like referring to me as a fatal plant?”

 

“No, you dumbass,” she teases, voice light, gentle. Oh, there’s another thing she’s going to have to live without. That exact tone, the teasing notes, and ease of words slipping past. “The  _ other  _ meaning.”

 

“The oth-Oh.” Blake had told her as a joke one day when they’d been messing around, ridiculous ten-year-olds reveling in their stupidity, cracking jokes that made no sense, had no ground. Yang was teasing Blake about how their gym uniform was practically falling off of her. Blake had crossed her arms and said with as much falsely infused bravado as she could muster,  _ “Excuse me, but my last name literally means beautiful lady. Show me some respect.”  _ Well, that was awakening a stirring in her stomach and an ache in her chest at the simple realization. “So you’re just walking around call me pretty all the time?”

 

Blake would bet pretty good money that Yang’s cheeks are flushing red right about now. “It’s a nice name is all.” She takes Blake’s chin between her forefinger and thumb, forcing her to look towards the night sky and the clouds overhead. “Look at the damn stars already, would you.”

 

The smile pushes past Yang’s grip on her face, breaking free. “Sure thing, Beautiful.”

 

“Shut the fuck up.”

 

Blake giggles. “It’s downright impressive how you can go from sweet to bitter in half a second flat.”

 

“I  _ will  _ shove you off this net,” Yang threatens, voice light and gentle, hands just barely pressing against Blake’s side until Blake is laughing, pushing her body back.

 

“No, you won’t,” Blake challenges, looking to the moon and the stars that glimmered above her and pressing her left arm flush against Yang’s siphoning her heat. “Wouldn’t want to risk ruining my pretty face.”

 

Yang’s fingers wrap their way around Blake’s, twisting their hands together, intertwining their fingers. “I hate you, Belladonna,” she whispers into the night breeze, eyes fixed, lungs full.

 

“Love you too, Xiao Long.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thought you all might enjoy some more pain before I'm gone for the weekend. Thanks again for all the feedback! Feel free to come say hi on tumblr sometime. There were like, four sentences this chapter that didn't hurt, right? Baby steps.
> 
> Hope everyone has a great weekend!


	6. Chapter 6

_ 24 _

 

“No!” Ironwood drops his head into his hand with a frustrated sigh. “That attitude of yours is exactly how you lose favor with a jury. Do you grasp that, Ms. Xiao Long?” he asks through gritted teeth. 

 

So far most of their preparation had turned into Yang and Ironwood fighting with each other with Blake’s occasional input or some instructions sent her way. She’d been working through a strategy at home as well, going over notes with Sun while Neptune acted as the defendant, walking with unnaturally straight posture in front of her and adopting some strange accent. It made him sound more “official” apparently. 

 

“Well, you’re an ass!” Yang shouts back, fists hitting the table. Two days of this, three to go, combined with the closeness, the reminder of what being next to Yang was like. 

Blake was suffering. Yang flops back, looking to Blake and rolling her eyes, the movements around her disturb the air.  Citrus swallows Blake whole as she instinctually smiles in Yang’s direction. She’d never suffered more happily in her life.

 

“That’s their only goal, Yang. To get under your skin,” Ironwood reminds her, standing over top of her, finger pointed into the table. “You can’t let it happen so easily.”

 

Her eyes narrow towards him. “I held myself together just fine on the stand when they tried that last time.”

 

“That was nothing,” he warns, voice dark. “We’re going to reconvene Monday morning with a whole arsenal of extra information and do you know that means?” Blake does. She keeps her breathing even. One, two, three, four, breathe in. “That much more to use against us.” One, two, three, four, five, breathe out. “And you’re tripping yourself up in your damn pride.”

 

“I’m not-”

 

“You are,” Blake interrupts. She’d been silent, letting them fight for an hour now, afraid to speak up. But the idea was ridiculous. Yang wasn’t anyone she should be afraid of voicing her thoughts to. And, at least in the past, Yang listened to Blake’s views, asked for her honest critiques over everyone else’s.

 

She turns with eyebrows raised in Blake’s direction. “Excuse me?” she asks, almost like she can’t believe Blake would ever have the  _ audacity _ .

 

“You’re so caught up in making sure no one sees you as weak that you forget how your strength can be used against you.” Neither of them needs to so much look at each other to acknowledge Blake is referencing that night, just where Yang’s strength had landed them. “I’m sorry, that wasn’t-”

 

“Shut up,” Yang spits out, pushing back from the table and taking measured steps towards the other end of the room. She tucks her hand against her chest as if she can hide the way it’s shaking. “What the hell do you know?”

 

Blake’s stomach drops. She pushes her chair back, following Yang over to the opposite side of the room. The early afternoon light shines bright through the window, the blinds pulled open, dust motes floating in the air. The space next to the glass is colder, goosebumps rising along Blake’s exposed arm. With a roll of her eyes, Blake perches against the windowsill, arms crossing over her chest. “I know it’s been a couple years, Yang,” she tries her name out, finding that it’s always lived on the tip of her tongue, has been waiting to be put to use once more, a muscle memory never forgotten, “ but you can’t be so dense to think I don’t still know you.”

 

Yang’s eyes jump from out the window to Blake. Her gaze is hard, eyebrows furrowed, lips set in a frown. “You can’t be so ignorant to think you do.”

 

“Yang,” Blake says again. It was so much easier than fighting against it. “Come on. Who’s the bravado for? Me?” If looks could kill… “I get it, okay? You’re fine without me. Thriving not just surviving and all that shit. You can let your guard down.”

 

In response Yang laughs, hands braced on either side of the window frame, her pinky finger sits a mere centimeter from Blake’s hip, and Blake hones in on it, fixated at the closeness, the potential for even the barest of touches. 

 

“She’s right,” Ironwood says, his contribution wholly unwelcome. “This is only going to work if you two are willing to work together. You gotta trust each other, especially in this room. Or else we can never truly prepare.”

 

Blake utilizes their mutual dislike to try and ease her way back to some pretense of friendly. She tilts her head in Yang’s direction, eyebrow cocked, her expression saturated with a nonverbal  _ can you believe this guy?  _

 

A smile cracks before Yang presses her lips together, suppressing it. “Fine,” she says, and Blake can envision the chipping away of layers, one after the other to attempt and reveal an approximation of who Yang really is, who she’s become from this whole mess. “I’ll play broken little girl, happy?”

 

“I’ll take what I can get,” Ironwood says, spreading his hands out to invite them back to the table. “Alright, next order of business.”

 

\--

 

_ 7 _

 

Halfway through the school year Yang can’t help but ask Blake why she doesn’t ride her bus. Their houses aren’t that far apart; it wasn’t hard to see the outside of Blake’s house through the eternally half-opened, grimy window of the school bus.

 

“My mom drops me off,” Blake answers in the hallway, following Yang back to class after library, straggling behind the rest of their classmates.

 

“Every day?” Yang demands, unable to wrap her head around it. Didn’t everyone take the bus? Weren’t they all making their own breakfast, helping their little sisters get dressed, and finding homework? “Why?”

 

Blake shrugs, “I think she likes it?” It’s not a question, but Blake’s voice lifts at the end, unsure of her response.

 

The next day, Yang stands outside the school, right where the line of cars for kids getting dropped off is. She sees Blake in the front seat, backpack on her lap. Her mom leans over and presses a kiss just between Blake’s cat ears. It’s a simple gesture, but the display of affection cuts its way through Yang. She turns and heads for the entrance to the school, trying to ignore the swelling sense of loss within her. She replaces the sadness with a warmth, a fire waiting to ignite.

 

\--

 

_ 21 _

 

Kali wasn’t one to just, go against what people wanted. Even when Blake was young, she believed in hearing her daughter out, understanding her reasonings before making any declarations. There was no “my house, my rules” policy. She wanted her daughter to feel like her opinions had a place—like they deserved to be heard. One of the parenting books she read said it helped girls grow up to be more assertive, to stand their ground better.

 

Well, she’d spent more than a year allowing Blake to make her own choice when she was just sixteen years old, still a baby.

 

Ghira insisted that they couldn’t just drag Blake back. Blake reminded them that, legally, she could choose where to be now when Kali had tried to force her out anyway.

 

It was seventeen months without her daughter, and Kali had learned a lot during that time. 

 

When Blake came home, it had healed the holes in her heart while the fissures remained. Her daughter was still broken, far more now than when they had left. It was more exacerbated than when Kali had first started noticing the shift a month after arriving in Menagerie or a year later when Blake was somehow fighting her way to the frontlines. More time and more mistakes and then she was too far ahead of her own mother, in over her head in a cause that was hers to fight but never to this extent.

 

So this time Kali is not listening to Ghira, as good intentioned as he may be. She didn’t even bother mentioning it to her therapist, just canceled this week’s session under the pretense of unavoidable plans.

 

She writes a note in her neat, concise handwriting and leaves it on the table for her husband, wheeling her suitcase out the door behind her, not stopping until she’s wandering off the jetway, the drenching heat sneaking in through the cracks as she goes. 

 

The rental car is small. It’s not until she climbs in and the engine revs to life that her face drops into her hands and she cracks. Her daughter had already been broken so badly, bruised and beaten and taken advantage of, not allowing anyone, not even her own mother, to help her out of it until she’d been so crudely  manipulated she could no longer see herself clearly in the mirror. 

 

Nothing hurts a mother more than watching her child suffer. Nothing breaks her heart more than knowing there’s no way to fix it.

 

This time is different. She can’t fix what happened, god she didn’t even know it was a possibility. But she can be there, will be there, for her daughter one way or the other. She was going to stand in front of the stunning young woman who had been roughly crafted into the warm, sharp, brave person through tragedy and the reforging through fire. 

 

Her friend had called them a few weeks ago, talking with nervousness in his tone. He mentions Yang, how he’d tried her first. Kali cries before she can even get off the phone. Of course, he would reach out to Yang first. That was really who her daughter needed. The concept was easily accepted because it had been fact for so long now, undisputable. Yang became the most important person in Blake’s life long before Blake was supposed to stop needing her mother. 

 

The townhouse isn’t run down, though it also is hardly anything special. She leaves her bag in the car, sunglasses on her face as she knocks on the front door, waits. 

 

A boy with blue hair opens the door, and he evaluates Kali for a moment before recognition dawns. “You Blake’s mom?” he asks, already stepping aside to let her in. 

 

“Yes,” she says, taking in the notebooks stacked on the coffee table, the pillows and blankets folded on the couch, the pieces of her daughter that existed on another continent even when she had run from so much else.

 

“Thank god,” he answers, shutting the door behind him. “Don’t take that the wrong way,” he clarifies quickly, hands held up as he backs into the kitchen, it was all the same room really, and pours a glass of water as an offering. “I love Blake. She’s great. That’s why I’m glad you’re here.”

 

Kali understands. It was hard to exist around someone who holds so much sadness, so much misery. Especially when it was someone you cared about. “Is she here?”

 

“Mom?” the voice answers her question, and Kali turns, finds Blake in the doorway of the bathroom, towel hanging around her shoulders, hair hanging in wet strands down her back. “What-why are you here?”

 

Blake had tried to push past needing her parents even before they’d joined the White Fang. Somewhere along the way she had developed this desire to stand on her own and had refused to let anyone show her it was unnecessary. She stopped crying in front of Kali, stopped coming to them with her nightmares, stopped needing kisses for her bruises. 

 

It’s no surprise now that she still doesn’t want her mom to come and fix her, to offer out some false promise of healing, of easing a pain that didn’t have an end. “Blake,” she says simply. It doesn’t seem like that long ago that she was whispering that name against a bundle of pink—smooth, sweet-smelling skin pressed to her lips. 

 

The boy with the blue hair slips by, vanishing into a room and shutting the door, leaving the two of them alone. 

 

“Why are you here?” Blake asks again. Her eyebrows furrow. Her eyes blink. There’s no hiding the truth, no tucking away the dark circles under her eyes, the dimness to her expression, the tension of her muscles. 

 

Kali wants to put her daughter back together again. “I’m not letting you run away from me this time,” she cries with a hand pressed against her lips. “You can run however far you want, but you don’t get to leave your mother, do you understand me?”

 

Blake’s mouth is open as if waiting for a reply to come to her. “Mom, I-”

 

“I don’t care,” Kali cuts her off, covering the distance and wrapping her arms tight around Blake’s shoulders, pulling her close, not put off by the cold press of wet hair against her arms. “I’m not letting you. Got it?”

 

There’s a hesitation before Blake gives in, settles against Kali’s embrace and fits herself there like the little girl climbing onto her lap in the mid-morning light, the six-year-old seeking out comfort in the middle of the night pressed against her mother, the eighteen-year-old prodigal daughter returning.

 

“I messed up,” Blake cries, and Kali doesn’t know what she means if it refers to the night that lead to where they stand now or if she means running in the first place or maybe she’s jumping back to when she was thirteen, vulnerable and unknowing.

 

“It’s nothing we can’t fix,” Kali says into her hair. “I’ve got you, baby girl.” She doesn’t know if they can, not really, but they can pretend for a little while. She can try her best and inevitably fall short, but at least she can be here. At least, this time, she can try.

 

\--

 

_ 24 _

 

The menu in Blake’s hands has a somewhat sticky residue. She takes her napkin to try and rub it off. A place like this was not Weiss’ usual choice, so Blake had been a little surprised when it had been suggested. 

 

The whole process had been uncomfortable. Weiss was grabbing her shoulder after the hearing on Tuesday, one foot behind her on tiptoes, twisting back and forth as she tried to get out an offer to go to lunch. It was like being back in the seventh grade and getting asked on a date. Except potentially more awkward. 

 

Weiss sits across from her with perfect posture, her previous go-to hairstyle of smooth ponytail exchanged for loose hair around her shoulders. She tucks a section of it behind her ear, correcting the pale blue strap of her dress as it falls. Weiss wasn’t one to fidget. She hadn’t stopped moving since they got here. 

 

Blake orders fish tacos, tacking on another drink for herself while she’s at it. A little extra alcohol might be needed to make it through this. “So, Weiss,” Blake says. She wasn’t against silence usually. Weiss had a way of making it painful. “How have you been?”

 

Weiss looks up, the dim light hanging above them catching on the right side of her face. “Good,” she answers with a nod. “With graduate school almost coming to an end there’s a lot to worry about still, but I’ve been preparing for my boards extensively.”

 

“You know I’m not Winter, right?” Blake asks, reaching for her drink. “You don’t need to, like, prove yourself.”

 

Weiss’ eyes widen before she blinks, settling herself in her seat. “You’re right. I’m sorry.” Her head hangs, and she picks at the paper napkin on her lap. “I’m not used to this.”

 

“Lunch?” Blake attempts to quip.

 

“Feeling like I don’t know you.”

 

Weiss sounds broken as she says it. It cuts through Blake until she is too. “Oh. Right.” Two years is a long time. “It’s been awhile.” Too long.

 

The straw bobs up in Weiss’ sparkling water. She reaches forward, pushing it back down. The table next to them laughs loudly, heads were thrown back and a child squealing. Weiss doesn’t even glance to them. “I’m happy to see you.” Her smile is kind but her eyes uncertain. 

 

“Same here, Weiss,” Blake says. Back in college, they’d spent plenty of time alone. Whenever Yang was working the late shift and Blake was waiting in her dorm room for her or third year where she and Weiss both had an awkward break in the early afternoon and got lunch together in the dining hall every Thursday. They weren’t just friends by association, though that was how it started. Now Blake can’t help but wonder if they could be counted as friends at all. 

 

“It’s not the same without you,” Weiss says quietly, holding her gaze on Blake for a second longer than expected. “You’re the only other person who would take the initiative to clean the bathroom.”

 

Blake smiles. “Well someone had to do it,” she says with a roll of her eyes. “Yang sheds like a dog.” Her smile drops. “I’ve been to Atlas.” She changes the subject.

 

“Really?” Weiss says in surprise. “What possibly took you there?”

 

“My job,” Blake answers setting her drink out of the way as the waiter deposits the food in front of her. “I finished up my degree in Vacuo.” She pushes on while keeping her eyes on her food, making the wrapping of a taco seem like more a production than necessary. “I’ve been to a few different newsrooms now. Turns out my niche is social analyses and political pieces.”

 

“Turns out?” Weiss asks around a bite. “Didn’t we always know that? You were a poli-sci minor.”

 

No part of her ever believed she’d be able to follow through on any approximation of that route. “True,” she says. “Atlas was definitely my most interesting stint in that area.”

 

“I’m sure,” Weiss shakes her head. “Bunch of racist asshats.”

 

That particular word choice throws Blake off, making her snort into her food. “You aren’t wrong.”

 

For a minute they lapse into silence, silverware ringing against dishes, the setting of a cup being placed on the table, the rattling of ice.

 

“What about now?” Weiss finally asks, peering up from her plate but not quite looking at Blake. “Do you think you’ll be doing more travel after this?”

 

It’d be nice if she had a real answer to offer. Blake shrugs, fork picking at her rice and beans. “I don’t really know where I’m going next.”

 

“You could stay,” Weiss says in a second, the innocent optimism in her tone reminding Blake of Ruby. Her heart twinges when she considers the amount of collateral damage she’s left behind. “If you wanted, I mean.”

 

Blake smiles kindly, nodding. “I don’t know if I’m...that might not be a good idea.”

 

Weiss registers what Blake is talking about quickly. “Yang misses you too,” she says to her enchiladas. “She won’t admit it, but...she hasn’t been the same since you left.”

 

That would be because I caused her arm to get cut off, Blake doesn’t say. “Doesn’t mean she wants me to come back, Weiss. Not now.”

 

An argument is coming; Blake can feel it build, the highs and lows swirling together to create a perfect storm of dissent. “Don’t.” Blake cuts Weiss of before she can begin. Her arms raise and the waves settle, the clouds disperse. “Please.” She lowers her head and the rains conform to her plea, the tide goes out, dry ground left beneath her.

 

“Okay, Blake.”

 

Her hands long to dig into the sand below, reach the dampness it holds. “Thank you.”

 

\--

 

_ 23 _

 

The airship rocks, bobbing side to side in a short burst of turbulence before calming and bursting free from a cloud. The amber light of the sunset illuminates snow-kissed ground below. Strips of snow on mountains, patched along fields, glittering by lake beds. It’s a beautiful sight. Blake isn’t a stranger to beautiful, though this one is entirely different.

 

The pressure shifts as the plane dips down. There’s a momentary heaviness and a clogging to her ears. 

 

Atlas had never been the plan. Running away was temporary. Blake reminds herself of this fact nightly. But returning home, wherever that may be, it feels like no more of a solution than snow-capped mountains beneath her. She was running away, sure, but maybe now she was meant to find a new normal, a new home. 

 

_ Not possible,  _ a voice in the back of her head the creeps along the sides and slithers right into the forefront, declares.  _ You know where your home is. Don’t lie to yourself.  _ The not lying had been a regular exercise as well. Once the poetry was leaving her nauseated with herself, Blake tried to force the possibility of moving on, of becoming someone new, someone who needed no one, longed only for freedom and solitude.

 

It was the worst lie of her life. She couldn’t convince Sun or Neptune, let alone herself. The tricks didn’t do anything to convince her that she was happy. Hell, she wasn’t halfway to content. Surviving, yes. Thriving...well was that a real thing once adulthood caught up with you? Once the trauma had seeped into your years and tainted the good with all of the bad that followed like a magnetic cloud, drawn just to you.

 

She doesn’t want to go to Atlas. Sure, there’s a job available which is half the battle of finding a purpose, that’s what the therapist she saw all of two times kept saying at least. The job opportunity sounds great, spectacular, life-changing. She’s thrilled that in all of her failures and short-comings she has at least attained success in some aspect. 

 

Atlas is not what Blake ever hopes to call home, though. Atlas was cold, damn near desolate in her mind. She thinks of Atlas and envisions ice masses and igloos with big fluffy parkas and husky dogs pulling sleds. A ridiculous, unfactual concept, sure, but Blake hated the cold. After receiving this job offer, she had tracked the temperatures in Atlas every day for three weeks. It got  _ cold. _ So yeah, one more reason to hate it. 

 

The wheels of the plane hit the blacktop, the jerking motion sending her body on a gentle rise and fall, heads in front of her nodding in synchronicity. 

 

Atlas wasn’t where she wanted to be, but it sure as hell was exactly where she was going to remain. Distance was good. Distance gave perspective. Vacuo wasn’t far enough, didn’t offer the same potential as a complete ocean between, an entirely separate land mass to settle upon. 

 

The landscape is nothing close to desolate even as snow falls gently from the sky, a dusting coating the runways as equipment runs along them again, wiping it clean. 

 

Isolation wasn’t the goal. It was more of an added benefit. Being alone meant she was only a danger to herself; it meant that there was no one who could ever begin to encroach on Yang’s territory, could impede on memories or dreams or the way her blood filled with heat and her heart leaped from her chest and her soul breathed easy.

 

Isolation was for the best maybe. 

 

She was going to go ahead and stick with that lie for now. Maybe she’d be able to fool herself this time.

 

\--

 

_ 24 _

 

They get the text from Ironwood that he was going to be late after they’re both already in the conference room. Yang looks up from her scroll to find Blake still staring down at hers, teeth digging into her lip. This wasn’t worst case scenario, but it was damn near close. Gold eyes swallow Yang whole. It was way too close. 

 

“I guess we should…” Blake trails off, fingers picking at the edge of her nail. She didn’t know how to finish that sentence any more than Yang knew how to start one. 

 

It was almost funny; there had once been a time that she didn’t go a day, an hour, without talking to Blake in someway. Not talking made her feel uneven—like she was missing something. Now they had spent two years not talking and she didn’t know how to start again, was pretty sure she didn’t want to. 

 

“Do you think he could win?” 

 

It wasn’t really funny at all.

 

Yang sighs, she doesn’t want to consider that possibility. “I don’t know,” she says evenly. “I’ve learned that anything is possible.” That the things you know might not be true. Nothing is certain. You have no say in the choices of others.

 

Blake’s head snaps up, guilt layered in her skin, stitched into her very being. “Same,” she whispers. 

 

There’s more to say, the words almost come to life between them even as they refuse to speak. But Yang is stubborn to a fault, always has been, and she grinds her teeth together, skims social media on her scroll, pretends that there’s any value in pictures of people’s dinner or humourous joke of the week executed in excess. 

 

When she checks the time again, it’s been exactly five minutes. 

 

Ironwood texts a second time, tells them to get started, that he was going to be a while but would be there as soon as he could.

 

“How the hell do we get started?” Yang asks her scroll. “Do we just take turns barking orders at each other and sighing?”

 

Blake cracks a smile. “I can pinch the bridge of my nose every few minutes too.”

 

“We don’t need him at all.” 

 

The moment dims as quickly as it had started. Blake’s smile across the table fades. It’d be easier if Yang wasn’t still able to read her, if two years had made any difference. But god, Blake’s an open book and Yang can’t stop glancing, stealing words from the pages. The need to talk, to communicate—it’s eating Blake alive.

 

Yang was stubborn to a fault. She was lost in gold eyes and gentle smiles and an innate need to make Blake’s ears turn upright. “What were we supposed to work on today?” she asks against her better judgment. 

 

Blake’s the one with the papers, the notes. Ironwood passes them each a copy of everything. Yang shoves it in her jacket pockets, stuffs them in her bedside drawer. Blake puts them in a folder, brings them each day. One of those things just so happens to be an agenda, as if they were in fucking summer camp. 

 

“Today was supposed to be a mock trial,” she reads off the page. “Sun and Neptune have been doing those with me,” she offers the information even though it doesn’t really mean much. “I don’t think they’re very realistic.”

 

Yang knew Sun marginally, Neptune even less. She and Sun had a few conversations over the years, the last one not long enough ago, still stuck in her mind some nights. “Who wants to play lawyer first?” Yang asks, unbelieving that she was about to subject herself to this. 

 

“I can,” Blake offers. Yang doesn’t like that. “Or I can be in the stands.” Maybe Yang was an open book of her own; maybe she didn’t want to close her cover. 

 

Blake sits at the far end of the table. The light from the window shines around her like a halo. She folds her hands in front of her, resting them on the table, posture straight and steady. 

 

On the other end, several sanity-retaining feet away, Yang paces, trying to find her inner lawyer. 

 

“Ms. Belladonna,” she says, breaking out a voice that was some cross between official and customer service. “Please state your name for the people.”

 

“Do we have to do that every time we go up there?” Blake asks, head tilting to the side, ears quirking on top of her head. Yang’s chest clenches tight, adoration breaking free just from the small movement. 

 

Sanity was not remaining quite as easily as she’d hoped. “I’m assuming my role,” Yang insists. “Answer the question.”

 

“Blake Belladonna.”

 

Oh, that hurts too. “So, Ms. Belladonna, um,” the line of questions doesn’t come easily. What information did they need to come out for this trial to go in their favor? “Would you tell the jury about the night Mr. Taurus attacked you?”

 

Blake draws in a breath, eyes falling shut as the question enters the atmosphere. “He was following me,” she whispers, eyes still shut. “He’d been stalking me for months.”

 

“A fact that you knew,” Yang says. “Yet you did nothing beyond getting a restraining order. Why?”

 

Blake’s eyes open. They land on Yang. “I thought we had it under control,” she answers. “He was aggressive, but...I never expected him to escalate like he did.”

 

The conversations, there had been so many. They both had read the situation wrong, had been over assured of their capabilities. “Had he not escalated in the past?” Yang asks, eyes falling to Blake’s left shoulder, to the right of her ribcage. 

 

“Not like this,” she says. “He’d been violent, but after I left the White Fang...it had been a lot of years before I saw him again.”

 

“Did you think he had changed?” 

 

“No.”

 

They weren’t that foolish. “So why not call someone ahead of time? Why not get intervention before the incident that took place?”

 

“We tried, a couple of times. No one wanted to listen and, in the end, we decided we would deal with it ourselves. I thought we had it under control.”

 

They  _ were _ that foolish. “A poor conclusion.”

 

“Clearly,” Blake deadpans. 

 

They’re stuck. Yang doesn’t know what to ask. Blake has nothing more to add. “Did you think you were going to die?” Her voice drops back to its regular intonation, officialty wiped away.

 

“I didn’t care,” Blake says without a moment’s hesitation. “My life wasn’t my concern in that moment.”

 

Now Yang is the one shutting her eyes, trying to block out the pain before any more can seep in. The words were harsh enough; she didn’t need the vision of Blake in front of her, small and broken behind that table to go along with it. 

 

“Seems awfully reckless, Ms. Belladonna,” Yang picks up her show-voice again. “And after?”

 

Her eyes widen, mouth falling open as she attempts to find words. This hadn’t been discussed in court, no one asked about after. The after was assumed. Pain, medical bills, PTSD - no one needs that picture painted for them. “What about after?”

 

Yang paces, slow, methodical steps like Adam’s lawyer liked to use. She didn’t know which side she was questioning from, who she was role-playing as, maybe she was switching between the two, maybe she was slipping into herself in between. “Well, according to my records, you checked out of the hospital against medical advice.”

 

A swallow, a blink, tears always on the brink beginning to gather. “Yes,” Blake answers, looking down to her clenched hands, knuckles fading to white. “I received the necessary medical treatment before leaving.”

 

“So you were in the hospital for two, maybe three hours?” Yang demands, composure remaining. “And then you just...left? Went on with your life? It hardly seems like my client deserves fifteen years in prison because you suffered a minor injury and lost three hours of your night.”

 

Blake’s crying now, tears slipping past without sobs or cries to accompany them, falling faster than they can be stopped. “I lost more than three hours,” she whispers.

 

Yang scoffs, wishing she was still a defendant, wishing her voice wasn’t dropping, her tone scathing. “You went on and graduated college, got a successful career, have been traveling for work, right? I see here you’ve been published in newspapers and journals all over Remnant, Ms. Belladonna.” That same shitty tactic that had been used against her comes out. How much have you lost when you have gone on like I’ve never mattered at all? How much have you hurt when you live a full life without me in it? “Seems to me like you haven’t nearly suffered the same extent of loss as you claim, as you’re attempting to force my client into.”

 

“I lost everything.” Blake’s voice breaks, the end of her word vanishing in a croak. 

 

“Like what?” Yang demands, pushing on despite the fact that she wants to drop everything. The past pieces of herself, of them, are already on the floor at their feet. There are fragments and shards cluttered beneath them and Yang is done with attempting to find enough glue to hold herself together. “What have you possibly lost, Blake?”

Her body shakes with silent sobs and Yang knows where she’s supposed to be, the position she’s assumed so many other times. Her shoulders drop, hands unclenching, head falling. “Maybe this wasn’t a good idea,” Yang whispers, conceding. 

 

“Safety,” Blake answers, words strong. “I lost any sense of safety. I lost the person I’d rebuilt myself from after years of abuse. I lost…” she looks right to Yang, lines etched deep in her face, lower lip trembling as she draws in a shuddering inhale. “I lost my home.”  _ You _ . “I lost my happiness.”  _ You _ . “I lost the only person I’ve ever loved.”  _ You. You. You. _

 

“Did you or did you not,” Yang’s voice is a whisper now, any claim to role-playing a waste, “leave those things yourself? Is it really going to fall to the responsibility of my client that you ran away?”

 

Blake drops her face into her hands and sobs, cries like she means it, like she has no more energy to hold it back. “I left to protect the people I love.”

 

With a shake of her head, Yang surrenders. She can’t do this. “That’s a pretty weak argument,” she says, heading for the door. “Adam’s been in jail this whole time. Who were you protecting me from?” 

 

“Myself.”

 

“Wrong answer.”

 

\--

 

_ 21 _

 

March is too late for snow in Vale. It was supposed to be the beginning of blooms on the trees, dandelions popping up in the fields, warm, sunny afternoons combined with freezing cold nights. This year, winter has decided to make a reappearance. Seems about right, with all the other shit that’s happened in the last month, the cold, grey sky only seems fitting.

 

The snow falls in heavy flakes, wet and piling on the roads and sidewalks. It’s been two weeks since leaving the hospital. Yang was back at school, determined to finish out the semester, refusing to give up anything else.

 

The apartment is stifling. Someone is always there. At first, she thinks it’s a coincidence, but then one day Ruby leaves Juane parked in their living room when she goes out for class and he lets Nora in fresh from wrestling practice before taking his exit to work his shift in the dining hall. 

 

So she was on watch. What kind of watch, Yang couldn’t tell, but she hadn’t been alone for longer than a shower since leaving the ICU. 

 

It’s a nice thought, maybe. She’s still undecided. But it’s a Tuesday night, classes already canceled for the next day, and she can’t imagine another 36 hours of sitting in the living room with eyes on her. And she couldn’t hide out in their room, her room, to get away.

 

So she layers up. Her thickest leggings with her heaviest socks as she wiggles her arm into her coat. Turns out zipping was a two-handed job and, in favor of asking for help, Yang decides to let it hang open. “I’ll be back!” she declares, stuffing her key in her pocket and letting the apartment door shut behind her before anyone could ask questions. There were no answers anyway, as she was quickly learning.

 

Outside is eerily still and Yang’s muscles tense, left hand shaking. She shoves it deep in her pocket to steady it, drags a breath in as she steps out into the heavy snow. It crunches beneath her boot, packing down on top of itself. 

 

In an attempt to ground herself, Yang focuses on the sounds of her footsteps, lets the cold air wash against her exposed face, shuts her eyes against the pelting snow. She tries to hold herself to the sensory experience of the world, what she could touch and feel and know. Everything else was a big fat mess, too tangled to make sense of. Everything else, it turns out, were only concepts and possibilities and empty promises. What was in front of her was where truth ended. 

 

The snow rips open another raw, gaping hole.

 

One of the things the doctor kept talking about in the hospital was the scar. Going on about a clean-cut, how that means it would heal well. A singular, approximated scar drawn where the stitches held the skin together, forcing what was broken to hold itself in place once more. She didn’t bother to tell the doctor that she had far worse wounds left ripped open, that scars were the least of her worries.

 

The scroll in her pocket is like a stone weighing her down. She pulls it out, using her teeth to slip her left hand out of its glove. 

 

It’d been two weeks and she’d already formed a new bad habit. 

 

She goes to her recent calls and presses Blake’s name, holding the scroll to her face as it rings. Her heart pounds steadily in her chest. There was never an answer. But two weeks wasn’t long enough for her to give up, it hadn’t been enough time that Yang could be convinced that everything they had was-

 

“Hey, this is Blake. Sorry I couldn’t come to the phone but leave-”

 

-over. 

 

The snow is cold beneath her, but she doesn’t move, staring up at the sky, tongue running slowly across her lips, laughter reverberating in her head. The knees on either side of her, icy cold being pressed into her face, dramatic claims of hypothermia and finally, finally, Blake’s lips on hers. 

 

“Yang?” 

 

Shit. She pushes up with her left hand, running her arm across her face. She wipes away tears while smearing snow and cold. “Pyrrha, hey.” 

 

A dark green, gloved hand is held out to her, pulling Yang up. The cold sets in immediately, Yang’s body shaking against the wet and snow pressed into it. “Come on,” Pyrrha beckons gently, an arm around Yang’s shoulders as she leads her away. “I’ll make us tea.”

 

Being at Pyrrha’s isn’t exactly what Yang had in mind when she’d set out this evening, but considering she was found lying in a snowbank, maybe she can’t blame everyone too much for placing her under 24-hour supervision. 

 

The inside of the apartment is warm, the lights dim. Pyrrha lights candles as soon as they step inside, gentle strings playing through her speakers. “I’ll make us something warm to drink. Go pull out a dry pair of my sweatpants to put on. Bottom drawer.”

 

Yang follows instructions, too tired to remember that she could fight, could walk right out of here. She doesn’t want to anyway. She decides the inside of Pyrrha’s apartment is exactly where she’d wanted to end up tonight. 

 

Shimmying out of her pants take a second, but she pulls the dry ones on, finding immediate relief and spreads her soaked through jacket on the seat of a barstool as she walks back through to the kitchen.

 

Yang pulls herself up to sit on the counter, the empty sleeve of her shirt swinging as she settles. She and Pyrrha were close enough, having taken several of the same advanced math and science courses, and of course the initial philosophy class they’d all connected in.

 

The kettle chimes and Pyrrha pours steaming hot water over tea bags, passing Yang her mug with a warm smile. She allows for silence, not occupying herself with her phone or a book or turning the TV on, just stands leaning against the counter and sips at her drink, eyes wandering around the room. 

 

The candle flickering next to Yang smells of apples and cinnamon, just enough of a hint of spice that her heart picks up its pace, olfactory system tricking it into believing Blake was somewhere nearby. Gee, that was a fun feature. 

 

“Pyrrha,” Yang says when her drink is half gone, her mind circling down the drain, her wounds festering further as she rips them open with her bare teeth. At once Pyrrha’s attention shifts, focusing on Yang, waiting. “You, uh, you’re a big believer in that whole destiny, stars aligning, tarot card stuff, yeah?” A dumb question. Yang was currently drinking out of a Leo mug. 

 

“To an extent,” she says. “I believe we’re meant to end up in a certain place, not that our path to get there is determined one way or the other.”

 

As if on demand, Yang’s eyes fill. She blinks the tears back before they can fall, drawing in a deep breath. “Do you think we know our destinies ahead of time? Like, when you start the journey towards it, you stop and think, ‘This is it. This is where I’m meant to end up.’?” 

 

Pyrrha bobs her tea bag in and out of her mug, fingers wrapping around the body of her cup tighter. “I think there are no hard and fast rules, Yang.”

 

And god, she’s crying at  _ nothing _ which has been the theme of the last few weeks and she’s really fucking sick of it right about now. “I thought I knew,” Yang whispers. “I mean, no offense, I don’t really believe in any of this shit, the star signs or the planets in retrograde or religion. None of me ever has, but…” she swallows against the growing lump in her throat, trying to pull herself together. “I really thought she was my soulmate. I looked at her and thought, this is it. This is the best life could ever possibly give you. Because nothing could ever be  _ better _ than her.”

 

Yang doesn’t say her name; no part of her could manage that right now. Her name would drive Yang to her knees, would send a scream ripping past her throat. This pain was so visceral, so physically present. They kept talking about phantom limb pain the hospital, about how it could feel like her arm was still there, burning and aching. She wanted to ask if the same can happen to your heart. She wanted to know if that feeling ever went away.

 

“Yang,” Pyrrha says softly, gently, her hand on Yang’s knee. “There’s a lot out there. People, places, experiences.” She pauses drifting off as she looks down at her hand, pulling it away as she steps back and meets Yang’s eyes. “I think maybe sometimes we think we know where we’re going to end up, what our destiny is, when it’s something else entirely.”

 

“It was the only thing I ever knew,” Yang whispers, mug hitting the counter with a sharp slap as she sets it down. “And even that was a fucking lie.”

 

The cinnamon scent grows, swirling around her, overcoming the fruit. Her mind reaches for the lilac that accompanies it, searching for the completion of home that she’d adjusted to. 

 

“I don’t believe in anything one way or the other,” Pyrrha says, ring tapping against her mug as she adjusts her grip. “But I think I believe in destiny the most. I think I believe we’re meant to end up somewhere eventually.”

 

Yang’s eyes close, unsurprised to see Blake staring back at her as she does. “And?”

 

“I don’t know, Yang,” she admits quietly. “I wish I had a better answer for you.”

 

“Yeah, me too.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeah I'm sorry this is just...so depressing. There's progress but damn it's a little painful. So thank you to everyone who is sticking with this story anyway and for all of your reviews. I hope you like where this is going and that the end we're working towards is worth this seemingly endless angst. I appreciate everyone who's still willing to read!


	7. Chapter 7

_ 24 _

 

Pulling herself together is easier than falling apart. She’d had a lot of practice by now. Blake draws in heaving breaths until they slow, counting, steadying. The chair creaks beneath her, the spider in the corner holds steady in its web, waiting. The heat kicks on, warmth brushing past her skin. 

 

She wipes her face, her nose, breaks out a mirror to salvage what remains of her makeup, to look less like she’s broken altogether before Ironwood decides to grace them with his presence. Blake fully anticipates she will be alone until Ironwood’s arrival, doesn’t even expect Yang to return then.

 

The door opens, and Yang walks in. She places a paper cup of hot tea in front of Blake before making her way around the table and sitting at the end, the “witness stand” they’d created. “I’m up, right?” she says, eyes softening, apologetic. 

 

It’d be easier to say never mind, this isn’t helping us prepare for anything, but Blake doesn’t know how to shut her down. Not when she’s sitting in front of her like this, offering silent apologies and that same gentle love. Not love, maybe, but it’s not hate. 

 

“Right,” Blake finally responds. She bobs the tea bag in her cup; the water darkens further. “Um, okay, name?”

 

“Yang Xiao Long.” 

 

Blake nods. She stands at the head of the table and leans on to her hands splayed out in front of her, fingers tapping out a dull rhythm. “Ms. Xiao Long,” she follows the same proper sounding verbiage that Yang had adopted. “On the night of the incident, it was relayed that you made the first attack. Can you explain to the jury why that is?”

 

“I’m protective,” she answers. “Some say to a fault.”

 

“Probably not a good answer,” Blake says, eyebrows drawing together.

 

Yang rolls her eyes, leaning back in her chair, ankle coming up to rest across her knee. “Ask me why, dumbass,” she teases lightly. 

 

Asking the questions was a little more difficult than she’d initially assumed. “Why did you feel the need to become protective?” Blake asks, swallowing against the lump in her throat, the same one that always lodges itself right in her airway anytime she thought of this night. 

 

“We were being threatened,” Yang says. “Blake...he was circling her, like a vulture. He didn’t move to harm her, sure, but he had a sword drawn, and he made sure we knew it. That sure seems pretty threatening to me.” 

 

“And that justifies your attack how?” Blake had gone through this night a hundred times. How might it have gone differently? How might they have made it out of there okay? How might they not have made it out at all?

 

“He hadn’t made a move to attack yet, no, but he was building to it.” No one who hadn’t been in that room could ever understand the palpable tension, could feel the lingering threat as it grew, it was sneaking closer until they could feel its hot breath taunting on the back of their necks. The jury wouldn’t be able to grasp how their hearts were pounding, each in desperation of reaching the other. The intent was clear, his tone, his words, his actions - it was all building to one end result. “I was intervening before he had the chance to.”

 

Blake clears her throat. “How did you know?” 

 

“Excuse me?”

 

“How did you know he was going to attack? How do you know it wasn’t for show like he says?” They know, of course. Blake had seen him murder before; she’d witnessed his cruelty. Yang had listened to the stories, had eased Blake through the nights with her offerings of comfort, of gentle hands and soothing lips against her skin. 

 

Yang blinks at Blake, finding her response before blurting out the answer. “He has a history of being violent, abusive. I couldn’t assess his aggressive actions combined with his sword gripped in his right hand and see anything but an imminent threat. He presented himself that way to us. He wanted us to feel afraid. I was reacting to exactly what he was displaying and wanted me to pick up on.”

 

That was a good answer. Much like when Yang had been on the stand against Adam’s lawyer, Blake is impressed. “And why not let him attack first? Why not see what plays out before jumping to conclusions?”

 

Yang holds up her right arm. “Considering how his first strike ended, I think we can all agree that waiting for Adam to make a move first is a poor choice.”

 

Blake flinches. She didn’t like saying his name, didn’t like hearing it coming from Yang’s mouth. “In what way did you attack him?”

 

“I swung at him.”

 

“You attempted to punch a man with a sword? With no other weapons available?”

 

“Yes.” She speaks as assuredly as she had moved that night. 

 

“Why?” The heaviness of the question is as suffocating now as it’d been two years before. 

 

“To distract him.”

 

She’d always wondered, if Yang was being her carelessly protective self, jumping into a fight to protect Blake because it was what she did, or if it was thought out. Did she know exactly what she was risking and do it anyway? “Did you not think of how he could hurt you by you doing that?”  _ Did you not remember the promise you made me? Did it ever mean anything?  _

 

“Of course I did.”  _ I remembered.  _

 

“Then why?”  _ Do you not know what that does to me? _

 

Yang leans forward, stands from her chair hands placed firmly on either side of the table, leaning towards Blake, so their stances mirror each other. Her eyes are wide, fixed. “Because I didn’t care.”

 

“Why?” Blake pushes on, picks at a scab they both know will burst if the slightest of pressure is relieved.

 

“Dammit, Blake,” she spits out. “To save you.”

 

“Did anyone ask you to be their savior that night, Ms. Xiao Long?” Blake persists, holding her tone, her position. 

 

Yang’s arms drop. She stands up straight, shoulders dropping. “What?”

 

“Was there a reason you felt the need to take the initiative to become the distraction? To play the hero? Were you lead to believe that was what anyone wanted?” God, Blake is weak, more tears than resolve. “Were you not asked to do the exact opposite?”

 

The fight slips, defenses dropping. “I didn’t need to be asked,” Yang whispers. Her posture is fragile. If Blake pressed her palms against her, she would fall. “We were in it together. She wasn’t alone.”

 

“But if you’d let me fight my own battles maybe you’d still have your arm.”

 

“And maybe you’d be dead!” Yang shouts, the word echo in Blake’s head, bouncing off the memories, the imagery that never left. The silence that holds them after is deafening. “There’s this thing called risk to benefit ratio. We all do it, all the time, in most of our decisions. I compared the two in less than a second and made my decision.”

 

“How?”

 

Yang’s eyes squeeze shut. She falls back into her chair, fight gone. “Because the risk was that I get hurt or I lose a limb or I die. The risk was high, sure.”

 

Blake doesn’t want to ask the question. “And the benefit?” She can’t hear the answer.

 

“You might be okay.”

 

\--

 

_ 21 _

 

It wasn’t like Blake wanted to run away. She’d tried so hard to remain rooted to the spot, not to let the threat that followed chase her off. 

 

First, she listened to all the results of her tests and scans with half-interest—nothing vital hit, not too much blood loss, full recovery in four to six weeks. Then she checked out and snuck her way into the ICU. 

 

Yang was being transferred from one bed to another, nurses lifting her body on a sheet and setting her down, lifting the stump that was covered with crisp, white gauze and placing it on a pillow. No one else is there yet, no one is supposed to be, but Blake hovers in the doorway as a stethoscope is put against Yang’s chest, fingers pressing into her pulse points, blood pressure measured. 

 

Everyone filters out of the room but one nurse. She looks to Blake, glances to the gauze wrapped around her stomach and her bloodied shirt before holding up a hand, beckoning her into the room. 

 

“You aren’t supposed to be back here yet,” she tells her all while pressing against Yang’s stomach. “Her family is still hanging out in surgical waiting.”

 

“I know,” Blake answers. She doesn’t know how to say she ranked above family, that she and Yang were more to each other than blood. “I just need…” 

 

A kind smile is flashed in her direction as the nurse drapes the stethoscope back around her neck. “Five minutes, okay?” she squeezes Blake’s shoulder as she walks by, taking one last glance at the numbers on the screen overhead, the heart rhythm which was steady and consistent. 

 

The sedation hasn’t worn off yet. Yang breathes deep and slow. Blake picks up her hand, one that she’s held so many times, in fear and fun and happiness and love. She holds it now like a lifeline, a reassurance that Yang was okay; they made it out. Most of them, at least.

 

“I’m so sorry,” she falls to her knees, pressing Yang’s hand against her face, holding it there as her tears wet the skin. “Yang, I can’t...I’m so, so sorry.”

 

The pain lodges itself in her chest, sharp and unrelenting. This was her fault. Her presence had led to this tragedy. Yang was suffering and Blake had been the one to cause it. Yang would live the rest of her life missing apart of herself and Blake was the one who let it happen.

 

She kisses the hand in her grip, up Yang’s arm, to her cheek and her neck and her lips that don’t respond, no reaction anywhere. “I love you so much, Yang.” All those nights where Blake breathed those words into the darkness, expecting they never found their home, until the night Yang revealed the truth, told her she’d been listening all along. A part of Blake hopes now is the same, that Yang is there and can hear her, can somehow understand what Blake is about to do, can hear her swear her love, her grief, one last time before she leaves, runs away before she can make the person she loves most in the world face any more trauma. 

 

Blake sniffles, runs her free hand across her face before letting it fall against Yang, cradling around her cheek, thumb running gently over the bone, bumping into the oxygen tubing. “Hate me, okay? Hate me forever. Forget you ever loved me; just remember how horrible your life’s become because of me. I’m done destroying you, Yang.” Her forehead falls against Yang’s, her body half sitting on the bed as she leans forward, pressed nose to nose with someone who doesn’t even know she’s there. 

 

“I’m sorry.” She kisses her. “I don’t want to leave you. I...I know that’s the worst thing I can do.” When she presses her lips to Yang’s this time she swears there’s a gentle return. “I love you more than the rest of this world combined. Please. Hate me the same way.”

 

The last kiss is the hardest. Blake can feel consciousness returning. She knows if she’s there when Yang wakes up, she will never have the strength to leave her. She breaks the kiss even as Yang starts to respond, pushing off the bed and taking slow, determined steps towards the exit, hand pressed against her mouth to stifle her sobs on her way out.

 

\--

 

_ 24 _

 

Ironwood shows up another hour after their mock trials. He looks haggard, rough, but presents himself as contained and controlled as always. 

 

The first question he asks is what they accomplished without him. Blake and Yang exchange a look, press their lips together, bite back an answer. 

 

“Did you do anything?” he demands.

 

Yang holds up her soda. “A vending machine run,” she says, tilting her can in an imaginary toast. 

 

He groans, makes them run through fake trials again, this time with him as a lawyer. First, he’s the prosecutor, on their side, asking the questions exactly how they wanted, expected. Next, he’s the defendant. They’re less prepared.

 

Blake holds her own, answers his questions with composure, finds the right words even when she wanted to fall within herself.

 

Yang does not. There’s been too much already today and she is raw, exposed. She bristles at the first signs of an argument, bites before she bothers to growl.

 

“Yang!” he shouts after her third thoughtless argument, falling in the exact trap he’d wanted. “What the hell is the matter with you? We’ve gone over this.”

 

She flinches. “I’m tired.”

 

“Walking to the vending machine really took it out of you,” he deadpans, fingers pinching the bridge of his nose, frustrated. “We have two days.”

 

As if she isn’t already aware. As if she can forget it. As if she doesn’t shudder at the thought of being back in that chair, of Adam being mere feet away from her, of a jury that wasn’t there, can’t understand, can’t grasp the beginning of what they have been through and lost and suffered determining how this all ends.

 

“You have ten minutes.” He stands, posture straight and even as he strides from the room.

 

Blake’s biting her lip, staring down at the table. She looks like a kid in trouble. “I’m sorry,” she says to the table, fingernail scratching along the surface.

 

Yang brings her hands to her face, the pads of her fingers rubbing against her temples before reaching up to dig into her hair. “That is…” she drops off. That wasn’t what she needed, what she wanted. Sorry was nothing. They were both sorry for so much; regret was buried in every surface of what existed between them, guilt fusing the layers, mistakes nailed into the foundation. A single burst of wind could knock over the shaky construction, wipe out the structure until it became the remnants of a life lived scattered on the ground, remaining but never resuming its previous form. 

 

Yang jumps when a hand is placed on her shoulder, gentle, testing. “I’m sorry.” This time, Blake’s voice is layered with more, heavy and fractured. There’s a weak binding that keeps her together. Yang could pull it apart in an instant. 

 

“I don’t want that,” she says. Blake understands. Keep your regrets, your sympathies, your remorse. That is for you, not me. 

 

“I know,” Blake answers in a breath. Her hand remains in place, the fingers twitching, grasping for just a second, like they can’t help but attempt to hold on. 

 

The pressure is convincing, begging her to surrender. It’s time to fall against the piece that has been missing, slip into where she has been craving to belong for years now. “Take it back,” Yang whispers, not moving. Her entire body is still, neither succumbing to or denying the touch. She needs it too badly to turn it away.

 

“No.”

 

“Blake-”

 

“I’m sorry about  _ all  _ of it, okay?” Now her fingers are squeezing tightly, clamping down. “I’m not asking for forgiveness. I’m not expecting anything less of resentment from you. That’s not what I want.”

 

“Blake-”

 

“Hate me, okay? I want you to hate me, but I need you, just for these next few days, I need you to trust me.”

 

That stings in Yang’s chest, bites behind her eyes, shoots down her arm and tingles in metal fingers. Yang pushes the chair back and stands. Blake’s arm drops. The rush of air against Yang’s skin is unwelcome; she withers against it. “Do you think hating you is just...something I can do?” she asks, frustrated that this room has seen her fall apart so many times. Demeaned that she has lost her cool, succumbed to her past and her desires and her losses all in one space in the matter of a few days. She wasn’t here to fall apart and be built back together. Remnants were fine with her. She was more than okay with the broken pieces on the shore, the shattered portion of who she used to be and who she was never expecting to be again. 

 

“Don’t you get that?” Yang demands, her voice thick, those tears she’d been fighting against welling their way up, demanding to make an appearance one way or another today. They were being dragged out of her, kicking and screaming until they came to the surface, dropping like weights that had never been lifted, a burden she could never rise above and carry on beneath. “I can’t hate you, Blake. Call it what you want, but I’m fundamentally incapable of it. I’ve tried.”

 

Blake blinks, her hand still part way extended, still hovering where Yang had been beneath her. “I can’t let you go,” Blake whispers, the words seeming to surprise her as much as they do Yang. “I’m trying.”

 

“Why?” Her voice crumbles, shatters, she’s the one with tears on her cheeks, with a pain lancing through her chest. She doesn’t know how she’s still standing when there’s so much that could pull her to her knees. 

 

“I want you to hate me,” Blake declares, and she’s the one who’s seemingly not affected now, the one who can stand tall and respond and not dissolve into a miserable, shaking mess of a person. “I need you to never love me again.”

 

“That’s not possible,” Yang shoots back. If it were, she would’ve managed by now. She had tried so damn hard and it never worked. Five years of separation, two years of abandonment, and nothing works. Nothing gets her to forget Blake even for a second; nothing convinces her to give her up. “Since when did you get to decide what I felt? How I thought of you?” 

 

“Since when did you get to decide you can sacrifice yourself for me?” Blake shouts, hands clenching into fists, anger flashing on her face before it fades to misery. Her eyes jump to Yang’s right arm before shifting to the whole person standing in front of her. “What made you think you could do that? Why couldn’t you use some goddamn common sense for once in your life? Why couldn’t you think before throwing a punch?” With each question she takes a step closer until she’s just in front of Yang, there’s only an inch of difference between them with the heels on Blake’s boots, holding them so close to an equal level. 

 

Yang scoffs. “I told you, Blake. I did think. I always think.” There’s space behind her. She could step away. Her feet don’t move. “Even from when I was seven years old on the playground or jumping from that roof or in that room with Adam, I was thinking. I was thinking about  _ you. _ I was deciding in an instant that there was only one priority, Blake.”

 

“That’s bullshit,” Blake spits back, her voice fracturing, her own frustration rising to the surface and slipping past. “You decide that you get to prioritize me over yourself again and again and leave me behind to see the damage that I caused.”

 

“That’s not-”

 

“Yes! It is.” Her breath ghosts past Yang, the electricity traveling between them passing by in surges. “I can’t watch you sacrifice yourself for me! I’m not about to sit around and watch you lose piece by piece of yourself because of  _ me. _ ” 

 

Yang shakes her head, pressing her lips together to keep them from trembling, to hold back the sob seeking to break free. “You have no idea what you’re saying.”

 

“I know exactly what I’m saying!” Her hands come up, pressing into Yang, pushing her back with the slightest of force, the gentlest of shoves. There’s a desperation in the movement, a tenderness right between. “For fuck’s sake, Yang. I’m saying I love you! I’m saying it again and again and again in every second of my life because there is nothing that can hardwire it out.” 

 

“Yet you expect me to hate you?’ Yang asks darkly, voice falling, tone slipping. “Just like that? You spend every second of two years trying to move past me and fail miserably and you expect it’s any different from where I’m standing? Do you think I felt less for you, Blake?”

 

Those same hands that had been pressing Yang away moments ago now pull her close, fists wrapping around her clothing, pulling her closer, dragging Yang to her, absorbing every second of proximity she can soak up. 

 

Blake’s lips are trembling, only a fracture of a distance from Yang’s. There’s no choice left but to yield. Yang submits to the unspoken craving, feeds the hunger that has never died down, never stopped growling in demands to be fed once more. 

 

Their lips find each other out of instinct and habit and yearning which has only grown, only shifts and transitions but never fades, never vanishes. They meet each other halfway. There is nothing one-sided in this, never has been, and they fall into each other again knowing the other is going to catch them, ready to find a soft space to land. 

 

They find nothing less.

 

Blake’s hands tangle their way into Yang’s hair, burying amongst the strands, caressing along her skull, reaching out to cradle her face.

 

Yang twists an arm around Blake’s back, one around her neck, drawing her closer, pulling her in, absorbing every ounce of what is an undeniable mistake, another notch in this lifetime to destroy her a little bit further for when the ending swallows her whole. But god, if she’s going to make a mark, it might as well be a deep one. 

 

She pulls Blake closer and Blake steps into her, guiding Yang back until she’s pressed against the wall. Blake’s lips press into the tender skin of Yang’s neck. People change in two years, but not much. She finds the exact spot that makes Yang tremble in an instant, her lips sucking, teeth gentle but there, tongue soothing over in an instant.  _ You are mine.  _

 

Yang pulls Blake’s lips back up to hers, twists their bodies around, pressing Blake against the wall. She places her hands on either side of Blake’s head to hold her there, keep her at a distance for half a second so she can take the moment in. She’s committing the vision to memory as intensely as she is the sensation, the scent, the sound of want curling in Blake’s throat and forcing its way free. 

 

When she places her lips back to Blake’s she mirrors the sentiment, she folds like a bad hand in a poker game and kisses her soft and slow with all that pent up love and desire and fervor set free in a singular motion.  _ I am yours.  _

 

The world stopped for the two of them a long time ago. Neither of them stands a chance at making it turn.

 

The world has ended and started and stopped again. 

 

They don’t notice it’s responding to them. They don’t feel the pull of destiny any more clearly than the fact that they know their choices may not be their own. There is no opportunity of fighting back from this moment, no more chance of denial. Their beliefs formed from knowledge, dictating their choices. Who needs free will when the threads of fate are tightening them together, pulling them closer.

 

The universe is calling it like it sees it. Inevitability catches you eventually. They clutch to it tightly, thankful for the surrender. White flags raised, they find themselves in each other and release the armor, drop the hopes of banishing thoughts of the other, accepting that hate will never overcome what exists between them.

 

Surrender might be momentary, but it was swallowing them whole. Yang doesn’t fight against it, doesn’t push back. She takes all Blake offers. 

 

There wasn’t much to offer back, but her heart spills it out to be given freely regardless, unable to deny the woman in front of her, incapable of turning away from the oxygen it has lacked for so long, the home it has been restrained from returning to. It beats right, strong and steady as it pumps free the love it’s clung to, lets it warm Yang through to the bone. There’s no fire, no dull burn. It’s the sun in her veins, the stars falling in her arteries, a meteor shower in her capillaries. She is the night sky burning brightly and she offers it all to the one who has ignited her. She sparks, flames, and holds to the luminosity deep within. Spilling out, before she fades to black. She clings to what she has before it drifts back out.

 

The world is on fire and her heart is the point of ignition. Nothing stands a chance of stopping her. No one had better even tried.

 

\--

 

_ 21 _

 

Vacuo is hot; the only areas that were truly habitable were the ones by the water. The breezes skimming off of the waves were still warm, dry air blowing by, but it was something. Blake’s wardrobe transitions in response to the weather, forcing her to give up her dark skinny jeans and heeled boots in favor of shorts, open-toed wedges, (she wasn’t about to sacrifice her height as well) and tank tops. Everyone dressed like that here, it wasn’t exactly optional to do otherwise.

 

She sits outside a lot of days, a notebook in hand, writing things. In school, her creative writing courses hadn’t been her favorite. She liked reading fiction, but she was a non-fiction writer at heart, best at finding angles for articles, those brief, compact stories that had to fit lots of detail in as few words as possible. 

 

There were two classes she still needed to finish to get her degree. Every day she told Sun she was going to apply to the local university so she could finish them up. The one time she logs onto the website and scans over their courses, she just hears Yang’s voice in her head. With both of them finishing their degrees soon, they had talked about the future. It was only natural. They discussed graduate programs, but mostly focused on future jobs, where they wanted to go, what sort of apartment they wanted to live in, what sort of life they were going to create. 

 

Blake’s entire future was wrapped around Yang Xiao Long and now that she was on her own, she didn’t quite know where to go. So the idea of completing those two courses, of getting her degree and beginning a future she had never before considered, it was enough to make her nauseated. If she didn’t graduate then the future couldn’t ever begin, right? 

 

So she sits out on the balcony, enjoying how the sun begins washing over her body in the late afternoon, sinking low enough to bathe her completely just when most people were leaving work, driving home to dinner and families. 

 

Poetry had also never been her thing, not for writing, but there are words inside of her that she doesn’t want to hold back. If she gets them out, Blake is sure they’ll leave her alone, stop circulating back to remind her of how the sun might be wrapped all around her yet she’d never been further from the light. 

 

Every word she writes is about Yang. Even when she tries to think of something else, even when she starts with spilling out words that involve her history of abuse, the feelings of an inescapable past, it still transitions into something, someone else. 

 

Pages and pages of words entirely about Yang and there’s still an endless depth inside of Blake for more. Like no matter how much she writes about her, the memories will still be burned into her synapses, the chemicals that were supposed to be passed around forever sinking into the neurons, never relenting. 

 

She rips the pages out when she reads back through them, hoping that setting them free will help her with letting go. The symbolic gesture does nothing, especially when she stuffs all of those loose pages into her bag; they’re folded between her clothes, right into the middle of her novels. 

 

There’s nothing worse than the concept of forgetting Yang, even if that’s part of letting go. Forgetting is a tailspin of misery, a rush of panic. The first time that Blake tries to recall the exact shade of purple that Yang’s irises fade to in the evening light and she can’t, she writes a page and a half just about that color, trying to find the way to describe it until she’s thought on it long enough that she can remember. There’s the sensation of being seen, analyzed, worshipped, through those lavender eyes, the resting of eyebrows, the gentle curve of lips, settling of muscles beneath the surface.

 

It’s her own personal hell and Blake walks herself straight through the doors, settles her flesh and bones among the flames, submits her soul to the agony. 

 

The concept of giving Yang up entirely is worse. That complete separation is a new kind of hell, a fresh form of torture. Sacrificing her memories is a darkness that consumes beyond the slaughtering of her future. The heat is preferable to the emptiness; the pain more easily accepted than the void.

 

So she sits on the balcony. She soaks the heat into her marrow. She writes. 

 

One day, she’ll finish her classes. Eventually, she’ll work towards a future. Just now, she can’t give up the past. Please don’t ask her to.

 

\--

 

_ 18 _

 

Second semester of freshman year is when Yang finally meets her match in some of her classes. She’d signed up for more advanced classes, at the recommendation of her professors. The material increases in difficulty, demanding her attention, insisting she studies. It’s a transitional time when she comes home from her second class of the semester and says she doesn’t  _ get  _ it. 

 

Blake curls up against her in her dorm bed as she lays out textbooks, notebooks filled with equations, laptop pulled open to a webpage with solutions. She doesn’t know a thing about what Yang is learning, but lays there and listens to her reason through the answers. She drifts off to Yang mumbling to herself, pencil scratching against paper. 

 

Somewhere about a month in, it catches up to her. She’s doing well, exceptionally so, but she’s burning herself out. Blake walks into the dorm room, the one that isn’t hers but that Yang had gotten her a key to, just in case. 

 

Inside, Yang is passed out on her bed, books spread around her, laptop resting on her stomach as she breathes soft and even. She doesn’t even stir as Blake opens and closes the door. Blake lifts the laptop first, shutting it and setting it aside. Next come the textbooks, stacking one on top of the other on Yang’s desk, pencils and erasers piled next to it. 

 

The blankets are all bunched around the bottom of the bed, Blake reaches down and pulls them up, causing Yang to elicit her first little groan, shifting as she resettles into the position she tended to sleep in. Blake’s heart seizes against itself as she watches, warmth spreading from low in her stomach, up to the tip of her nose, reaching out to her toes. It’s impossible not to watch her, not to feel the swelling inside of her. Yang stirred up her insides, reached into her core and brought back hope and desire and love.

 

Love so bright it felt like it could, like it should, burn her alive. Love so tangible Blake is convinced she can grasp it between her fingers, can reach out and hold it. She wonders if holding on to Yang is the same thing. 

 

Lifting the covers, Blake climbs beneath, settling herself into Yang’s side, resting her head on her chest, the arm that was already splayed out to welcome her curls against her presence. Yang releases a soft hum, the vibrations from her chest fluttering against Blake’s cheek. 

 

“‘Bout time you got here,” Yang murmurs, nose pressing into Blake’s hair, breathing her in. 

 

Blake freezes, memorizing the sensation of Yang pulling her closer. “I wasn’t aware we had a designated nap time today.”

 

“Damn fool,” Yang answers back, voice heavy, quiet. 

 

Blake wraps an arm across Yang, pulling herself in, letting her cheek rest over her Yang’s, beating heart in her ear. She closes her eyes to let the sound overtake her, fill her entirely. After years of separation, after hundreds of mistakes, sufferings, Blake had found her home again. She rested easy here, muscles unwinding, blood cooling.

 

Right here was exactly where she wanted to be, the only place she longed to end up. “Yeah,” Blake agrees quietly, turning her face into Yang, finding her serenity, her joy, her ease all in one place, in one person. “Yes, I am.” 

 

\--

 

_ 24 _

 

“So you just...kissed her?” Ruby asks, Yang laying facedown on the couch, one arm flopping over the side, the other coming up to cover her head in an attempt block out as much intrusion from the outside world as possible. 

 

It hadn’t been a conscious decision to tell anyone, but the second she’d walked in the door and Ruby had been sitting with a blanket on her lap and a book in her hand...well her self-restraint had been tested enough today. “I kissed her,” came blurting out of Yang’s mouth before the door was even shut. 

 

Shooing Ruby from the couch, Yang planted herself in her place, groaning into the cushions. 

 

“It was more like we kissed each other,” Yang clarifies. “Technically.”

 

Ruby sits on the floor, crossing her legs beneath her and resting her elbows on her knees. “What does this mean?”

 

Yang groans again. “Nothing.” She’d determined that on her walk home, on her way up the stairs, when she’d opened the door to the apartment. She was going to determine it again while she sat here talking to Ruby, just for good measure. “It means nothing.”

 

Against better judgment, she turns her head to the side, cracking her eyes to evaluate Ruby’s processing of this fact. Her chin is in her hands, eyes incredulous. “Okay, but like, what does it mean?”

 

“I don’t want to talk about this.”

 

“You started it,” Ruby argues, sitting up straight and crossing her arms over her chest. “Talk.”

 

Yang pushes off the couch, mouth open, ready to argue, shout, tell her little sister to shut the hell up. But there’s a knock at the door, cutting her off before she can get going. “Lucky timing,” Yang mutters, swatting at Ruby’s head as she walks by for good measure.

 

It shouldn’t be a surprise. There’s no shock value in the fact that Blake is the one on the other side of the door. The reality gets Yang regardless. Makes her world stop spinning, her vision narrowing in. 

 

“Hi.” 

 

It’s been an hour.

 

After they had pulled themselves apart, to the sound of Ironwood twisting the doorknob and walking in, Yang had run a hand over her mouth, like she could wipe away the evidence of where they had been, as if she could wipe away the memory itself.

 

She’d taken one look at Ironwood, one at Blake, and excused herself from the room. She heard Ironwood muttering something about “self-sabotage” on her way out the door.

 

“Sorry I took off,” she offers. She considers tacking on a  _ that’s normally your style, _ but deciding against it. “Was Ironwood pissed?”

 

Blake shrugs, eyes shifting to the side before looking up at Yang. “I kinda bailed on him too.”

 

“Hi Blake!” Ruby chirps from her spot in the living room, laying on her back so she can peek around the coffee table.

 

There’s an immediate change to Blake’s demeanor, from uncertain and hesitant to a perk of her ears, a light smile on her face. “Hey, Ruby,” she answers, poking her head around Yang.

 

“Walk?” Yang asks, grabbing her coat from the back of the chair she’d dropped it on.

 

“Walk.” Blake agrees with a departing wave in Ruby’s direction.

 

It’s too cold to be outside, which they both know, but that doesn’t stop either of them on their way out the door. Blake buries her hands deep in her pockets, bracing for the cold before even opening the door to outside.

 

“Why’d you come by?” Yang asks the second the cold air greets them. The question would have suffocated them inside, swallowed them up by the weight of it growing. Outside was safer, where there was room for it to spread, to expand. There was a chance out here that maybe it won’t crush them both entirely.

 

Blake picks the direction, walking them away from downtown, towards the coffee shop they used to frequent and the park Yang would drag her through on a jog. This whole city was filled with the two of them. What they did, who they were, where things happened. Staying might have been the stupidest decision Yang ever made. There was no getting over someone when you were surrounded by their presence, crushed beneath memories.

 

“I don’t know,” Blake says as she bites into her bottom lip. They walk past the sushi restaurant that wasn’t as good but had free delivery. That was where Yang had slipped up the first time, mentioned marriage, a future, a forever. 

 

At the time, it had seemed assumed. She never thought there would be an alternative. She never thought she would be the one living it now. 

 

“What are you doing, Blake?” There’s no point holding it back. There were pretenses, sure, but Yang was pretty far past them, beyond the effort of pretending when she’s already crumbled to pieces, resolve dropped along the way like a trail of breadcrumbs she could follow back to the witch’s house if she decided to give up and be eaten alive. 

 

“I don’t know,” Blake whispers again, voice stolen away in a gust of wind, arms pulling closer to her body. “I walked out of that room right after you did and I just started walking and...that was where I ended up.”

 

Pausing in her steps, Yang waits until Blake realizes she’s no longer beside her. It doesn’t take long. “I’m not your consolation prize, Blake,” Yang spits in her direction, the arms at her side shaking, her hands opening and closing into fists, eyes shifting from molten gold to the barren, empty sidewalk ahead of them. “I’m not here to siphon off of until you’re strong enough to run away again.”

 

She nods. “I know,” she says. “That’s not why I’m here.” She begins walking again; Yang catches up and falls in step beside her.

 

“You’re here for the trial,” Yang says it for what it is. Fact simplified. There was no point hiding within the brush, tucking behind trees or burying the truth within the dead leaves cluttered on the ground. The straight forward reality was the only way Yang was going to make it out of this alive.

 

“Yes.” Blake must follow the same principles. “And no.”

 

Or not.

 

“Don’t do this.” Yang’s voice is dripping in desperation. “Please.” An angry sort of anguish. 

 

There is only one way this will end. History repeats itself. She wants out of the cycle, off the ride before it begins, before the highs leave her so much lower, the flips dizzying her to the point of disorientation, not knowing she’s on the ground until she’s been stepped on. 

 

“Yang, I-”

 

“Are you staying?”

 

“I can’t answer that right now.”

 

It’s not an answer and more than enough of one all at once. “What happened today was a mistake,” Yang says. A lapse in judgment, a sacrifice of self-preservation, the destruction of walls and protections until they were scattered around her feet. Two years to build, not even a week to knock down. “It shouldn’t have happened.”

 

“Okay.”

 

The surrender comes so soon. The fact that Blake doesn’t even fight stings, just a little. “Okay.”

 

\--

 

_ 19 _

 

The entire contents of Yang’s closet have somehow ended up around her room, pants strewn on the back of a chair, dresses cluttering her bed, socks and tights covering the floor. Everything has the potential to be good enough, but nothing is right. 

 

And it’s not like this is anything new. Blake knew Yang’s wardrobe by now about as well as Yang did. Aside from the few pieces of clothing that hadn’t followed her to college, she’d been alternating the same things her entire freshman year.

 

Ruby walks in, eyes widening and eyebrows raising as she assesses the disaster. “Dad’s gonna kill you,” she comments, shoving a load of clothes from Yang’s bed and throwing herself down onto her stomach, feet kicking in the air. 

 

“Dad will do no such thing seeing as I’ll close my bedroom door behind me and he will be none the wiser,” Yang says. “Though, I will kill you if you get any crumbs in my bed.” She throws a shirt which she’s decided is a definite no towards Ruby and her pop tart that was currently being consumed on Yang’s bedspread.

 

In a single bite, Ruby shoves the rest of the toaster pastry in her mouth, smiling wide as she attempts to chew. She asks something, words muffled before swallowing with an “Ah!” and wiping the back of her mouth. “Where are you going anyway?”

 

“Out with Blake,” Yang says simply, holding up a sweater. As if she would want to wear a sweater in June. Okay, this was impossible. 

 

“Can I come?” Ruby perks up. “I’m starving.”

 

“Dad left money for pizza.”

 

“Dad left money for pizza last week too,” she answers, pouting. “Plus I miss you and Blake. It’s not  _ fair _ you both went away to college at the same time.”

 

Yang shoots Ruby a look over her shoulder. “We all hung out yesterday,” she says, holding her breath that she’d be able to talk her way out of this. Ruby wasn’t exactly known for letting things go. The answering pout was palpable before Yang even glanced it in the mirror. “Don’t you have a video game to play or something?”

 

Coming up behind Yang, Ruby stands on tiptoes to place her chin on Yang’s shoulder as she faces the mirror. “Pleeeease.”  

 

Yang sighs, head dropping. Turning to Ruby, she grabs her shoulders and makes sure Ruby is really looking at her before getting the words out. She wasn’t doing this twice. “You can’t come because Blake is picking me up for a...for a date.”

 

It’s a process, the words entering the world and Ruby letting them addle around in her brain in contemplation of their meaning before her eyebrows shoot up, her mouth dropping in a little ‘o’ shape. “Like a date, date.”

 

“Yes,” Yang answers with a firm nod of her head. “Like a date, date.” She turns back to the floor, getting onto her hands and knees to begin sorting through the previously discarded options. 

 

“How did this happen exactly?” Ruby asks from above her, eyebrows furrowed like she still isn’t decided how she feels about this concept.

 

Well, there were a few ways to answer that question, not all of which would be appropriate for her little sister. “You know,” Yang says with a shrug. “It just sort of...happened.” 

 

Promptly, Ruby’s half on top of her, arms lacing around Yang’s ribs and squeezing tight. “I’m so happy for you!” she says, teeth clenched in the effort of her hug. “I knew you’d figure it out eventually.” Ruby pulls away, sitting amongst the piles of clothing, wide silver eyes blinking back at Yang. 

 

“I’m sorry, you what?” she stops searching, meeting Ruby’s stare.

 

With a roll of her eyes, Ruby starts picking through clothes, tossing a tank top and jeans in Yang’s direction. “Come on. You know I’m two years younger than you, not blind, right?”

 

Somewhere in her reflexes comes an argument that Yang bites back, pulling on the outfit Ruby had tossed in her direction without further question. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Yang answers, pulling her winter hat off the floor and onto Ruby’s head, past her eyes. “Now don’t tell Dad. I don’t want him getting all weird just yet.”

 

“Fine,” Ruby agrees, throwing the hat back to the floor and heading to the door. “But I get to be maid of honor.” She holds her pinky out, face serious.

 

“Okay, get out,” Yang shoves her from the room and shuts the door in her face as her protests begin. 

 

That could’ve gone worse, she decides, turning around and catching a glimpse of herself in the mirror. What was she thinking? Ruby was  _ not  _ allowed to dress her.

 

\--

 

_ 24 _

 

Blake doesn’t know what hurts more. 

 

Before had been hell, finally being within proximity once more, close enough to sense her, smell her, absorb her essence, holding citrus and smoke within her lungs—eyes able to fixate, studious and analyzing. But never touch. She can’t sense Yang on her skin, can’t hold her, feel the callouses of her fingers, the smoothness along the back of her neck, the curve of her lips, smiling against Blake’s skin. 

 

Before is hard. A craving just out of reach, tauntingly placed in front of her but never there, never all that she wants. Before is hell.

 

During—during is heaven. The moment she steps forward, the second her hands wrap desperately around Yang’s shirt, the instant their lips meet halfway, neither of them giving or taking any extra, both leaning in just the same amount. That is what every second of the last two years has been building to. This is the culmination of a never-ending exertion of delayed gratification. The instance has been waiting for her, could have been hers a million times over if she’d just been here. Instead, she’s gone and created complications, vanished the simplicity and masterfully crafted this convoluted relationship of soulmates turned strangers.

 

During is all she’s wanted since she walked away. It hurts deep within her chest though, like a cavity sucking her from the inside out, dragging her into it. Because moments are fleeting, they end much sooner than the buildup around them, then the time spent in the after. During is heaven for a minute, before she’s falling back to Earth.

 

After is a new sort of pain. There’s a hope, dull and dim and not fully allowed in the light. She refuses to nurture it. The reasons she left have not stopped existing. Her weaknesses shouldn’t determine what happens next. They won’t. At least, so Blake likes to make herself believe as she holds her coat tight around her body and takes hurried footsteps towards a home that never stopped being hers. When she thought of going home, it was still to this apartment building. It was still a musty stairwell, a mailbox that sticks, a living room filled with clutter, and a bedroom that was coated with light and beauty and a future all at once. 

 

After is now, and she’s not supposed to succumb this way. She deserves the hell, deserves to crawl on the earth, lonely and desperate. It is what she has chosen for herself. It’s the only method she can think up, the only choice that stands before her and leaves her to select it. She had tried to move on, to make something more of what remains. 

 

After is here and Blake is shit at living in it. She’s a new sort of weak. 

 

There’s no solution, no answer. It all hurts at once, a culmination building to a pain that spears straight through her, a sum of misery reaching its peak until she has no choice but to raise her fist and knock and pray that forgiveness isn’t an option, that Yang is stronger than she can be. That this will end before she can ruin anything more.

 

Yang’s answering, “Okay,” is the return to Blake’s senses. It’s when the pain ebbs just enough for her to reach the clarity, clinging to it. She may not deserve the misery she’s put herself through, the loss she’s selfishly decided they will both now endure.

 

Yang definitely does not deserve the damage Blake’s presence causes.

 

Of course, she’s angry, enraged that Blake has made a choice for them. It’s better that way.

 

Blake can only hear a tearful request against a hospital bed, flaccid hand clutched tightly in hers, lips unresponsive beneath. 

 

Yang had revealed that such a request was never realized. It didn’t surprise her; there was no shock tucked away there. But it killed her to know Yang still loved her. Blake had made a decision for them, and Yang had continued to suffer because of her, maybe she always would. Blake had caused enough suffering. All she wanted for them was a peaceful apathy.

 

There is no such possibility. Not before or during or after. It sounds defeatist. In recent years Blake had learned to pick your battles, take your losses along with your victories. 

 

She waves a white flag while standing on the sidewalk, not enough and too much space existing between them. She surrenders. There’s no consensus on who wins.

 

//

 

They could never just be friends. That opportunity had come and gone. It had drawn on for years, been realized and surpassed in the span of a childhood. 

 

Now there’s too much between them. A history that is heavy, could fill textbooks and research papers and museums across the world. Their history follows them, together and apart.

 

There is no possible way they can be friends. 

 

Neither of them had ever been very good at admitting the impossible, facing the inevitable. They held out until nineteen for a reason. 

 

So they offer their surrenders, face their sacrifices, but they don’t turn back. They walk, first in silence, then in short sentences, simple questions. At some point instinct kicks in, nature takes over. The conversation transitions from stilted to flowing, meandering like a creek through the forest, tripping over ledges and in between rocks, not straight and smooth, but continuing onward regardless.

 

The words don’t have to be consequential to be worth listening to. Yang grasps at the tidbits of information, the pieces of missing time that have haunted her, left her questioning for two years now. She can piece Blake together as a person she has always known as well as herself while also discovering portions of who she has become. As if she was there, Yang can see her thin tank tops in Vacuo, her heeled sandals strapped to her feet as she wandered the streets, finding a purpose, a belonging in a place that would never be good enough to claim her.

 

Picturing her in Atlas takes a second longer, but as Blake talks about the experiences she’s wandered into, Yang begins to envision it a little more clearly. Heavy layers, many of them—Blake was always cold. A black coat and a purple beanie, thick, furry gloves, a scarf up around her mouth and nose, as little of her exposed as possible. 

 

These locations, they had shaped Blake into someone new, a mold reformed from the same parts. 

 

“What about you?” Blake asks after some time, after the sun has set and the streetlights switched on, the temperature dropping as pedestrians thinned out first, the traffic second. “What have you been up to?”

 

And Yang knows. She knows what it’s like to wonder, to lay awake and think to yourself  _ where has my world vanished to? How has the sun been faring without me to warm?  _

 

“I’ve been good,” Yang says, a measly offering, insulting. “Busy.”

 

_ Moving on. Not thinking of you. Not missing you. Letting go. _

 

“Right,” Blake answers. “Me too.”

 

_ I failed it all. I miss you. I think of you. I have only moved backwards, closer to you even as you place an entire continent, an ocean, between us. _

 

“Yang…”

 

“Don’t.”

 

_ I’ve only held on tighter. _

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, I'm not allowed to touch this chapter anymore. I keep moving one scene up or deleting a sentence or two and it needs to stop. I tried not to lose hold of my ending completely and just have chunks of navel gazing so I hope that was actually successful. I have no idea at this point. As always just thank you so much to everyone who is reading and leaving feedback. My heart is tethered to this story and reading how much people are enjoying it is destroying me. Thank you!!


	8. Chapter 8

_ 13 _

 

The loss of Blake is felt in the family as a whole. Tai witnesses how the pain swallows his daughter but doesn’t know how to fix it; he’s wearing the weight of the burden on his back, in his shoulders. 

 

Ruby wants to fix it; she  _ tries  _ to fix it. Which is the wrong approach from the get-go, but she’s too young to understand that.

 

The day Blake leaves, Ruby does her best to stay at Yang’s side, trying to cheer her up long after the Belladonna family car has turned the corner and they’re still standing in their driveway, looking out at nothing besides the “For Sale” sign that sits in the front yard.

 

Yang doesn’t spend a single second of that day pretending to be anything other than devastated. 

 

After that, she starts to come around. Largely for Ruby’s sake, it’s obvious. In the following weeks she goes back to making jokes, playing games, being the big sister Ruby has always known. Now she’s just a little more attached to her scroll, always in the middle of a texting conversation, up late most nights talking.

 

When the next transition takes place, Ruby misses the beginning. She doesn’t notice until Yang’s got dark circles under her eyes, a redness tinging her irises. Yang tries to keep up her demeanor, but it slips more often then it holds in place.

 

The energy is gone. She lays on the couch, stares at the ceiling, never sleeps but never moves. There’s a fear that traces its way down Ruby’s spine, tingles in the back of her mind and in the beats of her heart.

 

Ruby starts paying attention, how Yang sends a text and there’s no ‘ping!’ in response, how, when she talks at night, it’s a murmur that lasts for a minute before there’s only answering silence. 

 

Oh, it connects eventually. Ruby’s never known betrayal, unlike Yang who has never known anything but. She feels this, though, even if it isn’t hers to claim. It’s impossible not to be caught in the ricochet, to ignore the aftershocks that keep shaking through her heart. It’s painful, and she’s eleven years old and doesn’t know what to do. Yang’s always been there for her. Always doing and saying and being exactly who was needed. Ruby doesn’t want to let her down, doesn’t want to disappoint in inferiority. 

 

Yang was only six when she used to bandage up Ruby’s cuts, only seven when she would pack their lunches, only a kid when she became a makeshift mom. Surely Ruby can do something at eleven. 

 

So she settles herself at Yang’s side as often as possible. She liked her company anyway; Yang wasn’t draining like the kids at school or her peers in the extracurriculars her dad had started insisting on. 

 

Sometimes it’s something simple, like watching TV together. Other times Ruby pretends like she needs help with her homework or whines for help in the kitchen. Whatever she can do to make Yang come out, whatever tactic it takes to make Yang see that she’d been abandoned again, but Ruby was never, ever going to leave her. 

 

At night, Yang tries to make it seem like she’s not crying, but sometimes Ruby can’t help but overhear, can’t help but slip into her room and into her bed. As soon as the door cracks, Yang pretends like she’s asleep, all even breaths and still body. Ruby climbs in beside her anyway, brushing her hair back the way Blake used to on those Saturday nights. “I love you,” Ruby would tell her in the darkness, knowing Yang was still awake despite how she pretended otherwise. Yang never answered her, but sometimes in the morning she would roll her eyes, kick Ruby out, tell her she’s too damn old to crawl into bed with her big sister all the time. 

 

Then, for a second, she’d soften, shoulders slumping, eyes falling; it’s not like they don’t both know the truth. “You’re such a little shit,” Yang would say a minute later, already out of bed, halfway out the door, “you’re lucky I love you.”

 

That’s all the acknowledgment she ever offers.

 

\--

 

_ 7 _

 

“Ruby!” Yang calls after her sister as she goes trotting into the school from the bus, rushing off to her kindergarten class. “You’re forgetting your lunch!” Yang holds up the brown paper bag with the peanut butter and jelly sandwich and banana inside of it. 

 

“Oops!” she comes rushing back, yanking the bag from Yang’s grip. Before she can dart off again, Yang places a kiss to the top of her head, right between her pigtails. 

 

The action doesn’t faze Ruby. Yang does whatever she wants, and Ruby rolls with it, never questioning her big sister. “Bye!” she yells behind her as she starts off again, her too big backpack flopping up and down on her back as she goes.

 

“Bye, love you,” Yang sighs to herself, starting towards Ms. Himmel’s class with far slower steps, the straps of the bag heavy on her back. 

 

Blake appears at her side a minute later. “Here,” she holds out an offering in the form of an opened, half-empty bag of Skittles. “I know you like the yellow and red best. I saved them for you.”

 

Yang takes a handful of candies and eats them on her way to class at eight in the morning, smiling back at Blake with the warmth of happiness that starts buried in her chest and grows all the way to her toes, to the ends of her hair. She smiles for the rest of the day, another rush warming her right through whenever Blake giggles next to her, passes her a note with a sarcastic comment on it, kicks her foot against Yang’s. Love, Yang figures out, can come through in so many different ways.

  
  


\--

 

_ 24 _

 

“Well, then what?” Weiss demands, voice rising in octaves, hands on her hips.

 

“Nothing,” Yang grumbles. All she wanted this morning was a cup of coffee, a bowl of cereal, and some goddamn peace. “Nothing happened. Okay?”

 

“You kissed her,” Weiss corrects immediately. “That is hardly nothing.”

 

There’s a pain that sears just behind Yang’s eyes, a clenching in her chest as it folds over itself in search of something long since missing. “It’s nothing because it means nothing. It isn’t going to turn into anything.”

 

Weiss tuts as Ruby’s heavy footfalls make their way into the kitchen. “She’ll get there,” Ruby says in a bored tone, words flat.

 

“I will get nowhere,” Yang corrects. The only place she wants to be is unattainable, a freedom from the past, the drawings of desire impossible to escape from. “It was a momentary lapse in judgment. You know, like deciding to tell the two of you anything.” 

 

“You guys were gone for a while yesterday,” Ruby taunts, a little more lively as she dumps sugary-filled coffee creamer into her drink. “What were you up to?”

 

Covering ground and then walking backward to where they had started—giving up and fighting onward in the same step, the same breath. “Nothing. I don’t know.” It’s too early for analyses; her night had already been composed of those. “I need to get going. I’m already on Ironwood’s blacklist after yesterday.”

 

She pushes back from the counter, lets the barstool scrape against the floor, the shriek filling the space around them, eliminating questions and answers all in one fell swoop. 

 

“Since when were you the one to run away?” Weiss challenges, coffee cup hitting the counter with a heavy smack. “Aren’t you supposed to face things head on?”

 

“Don’t,” Yang warns darkly, eyes narrowing. “I’m not in the mood, Weiss. Really.”

 

She huffs, rolls her eyes. “It’s been two years of you not being in the mood. You’ve been walking around here like a ghost since the day she left like you lost yourself-”

 

“You mean like my fucking arm!” Yang shouts back, holding up the black and yellow contraption that had replaced flesh and blood. “You don’t say.”

 

Ruby squirms, always uncomfortable when they fight. “Guys-”

 

“And now she’s here, Yang. She’s here be it because she has to be or because she can’t stay away any longer. It doesn’t matter.” Yang lets out a bitter laugh at that sentiment. “It doesn’t matter,” Weiss echoes, “because she’s  _ here _ and you’re both empty shells of yourselves, and it hurts to see you like this, okay?”

 

There wasn’t much softness to Weiss on the surface, but Yang can hear the quiver in her voice, can see the welling of tears in her eyes.

 

“I’m sorry my pain is uncomfortable for you,” Yang bites back even though it isn’t fair. She didn’t want to fight fair right now. It was seven AM, and there was still the taste of Blake on her lips, and the warmth of her hands pressed into her skin. It’s a new day, and everything is just the same—a new year and Yang is still in the past, still reaching for a future that was in the opposite direction of where she’d ended up. “I’ll try to find my pep a little more often, so you don’t have to suffer.”

 

Weiss rolls her eyes, and it takes Yang aback when a tear falls in the process. “You are miserable!” 

 

For two years Yang has been looking for a fight, and today she is more than ready to finally be apart of one.

 

“You’re miserable,” Weiss reiterates with her eyes narrowing, her shoulders squaring. “And I think that’s how you like it.”

 

“What the fuck does that mean?” Yang shoots back. 

 

There’s a haughty flash of white hair flicking over Weiss’ shoulder as if she’s working to assume the full potential of bitch that she’s been building to. “It means,” she says, taking a step forward, “that Blake leaving broke you. It means that her leaving you took a hell of a lot more out of you than just losing your damn arm. You broke because she left and you refuse to ever be anything besides that unless she’s here. You  _ want _ to be miserable.”

 

“Oh?” Yang demands, voice rising at the accusation. It was yell or cry. Her choice was made before she even consciously decides it. “That’s what you think, huh? You assume I’m just choosing to be moody and sad ‘cause my girlfriend left me?”

 

“I don’t think that-”

 

“Stay out of this, Ruby!” her and Weiss say in unison, heads turning to glare at Ruby before facing each other and fixing their hard stares. 

 

“You think losing my arm didn’t mean anything to me?” 

 

“I think losing Blake meant more,” Weiss challenges. “And you know it, Yang. You know that Blake leaving has destroyed you and now you don’t know how to heal.”

 

Fuck her for being right. “Shut the fuck up.”

 

“Not when I’m winning.”

 

Yang launches, a grunt of frustration tearing from her throat as she corners Weiss against a wall, her back pressed against it as Yang towers over her. She was furious, and there was nowhere for the anger to go, no way for it work its path through her system, a warcry that was never satisfied, never enough. “You don’t know shit, Weiss. You’ve always walked around like you get everything, like your privileged little lifestyle has made you better than the rest of us, but guess what?” It’s not fair. Weiss isn’t even a portion of the same person Yang had first met, but she wants to aim below the belt, wants to cause hurt where she still can.

 

“What?” Weiss demands, not even flinching with Yang’s fire red eyes burning down at her, the crackling in her bloodstream jumping out, the flicker of her hair caught in the periphery of vision. “Tell me.”

 

Yang pulls back. Her arms drop. She looks to Weiss and her eyes fade from red to violet in a fraction of a blink. “You’re right. Okay? Happy?”

 

Weiss puts a hand on Yang’s shoulder, squeezes. “Not in the slightest.”

 

\--

 

_ 11 _

 

Reckless Xiao Long, that was the reputation she was getting around the neighborhood. She only hoped it wasn’t going to get back to her dad or she’d be in for it.

 

If there was something one of the kids were too scared to do, Yang was already doing it. 

 

“I bet you can’t hang upside down from the tallest branch in that tree.”

 

“I bet you can’t ride the whole way down the hill while standing on your bike.”

 

“I bet you won’t eat that worm.”

 

Every day of her eleventh summer, Yang pretty much wakes up and completes a variety of deals. She doesn’t know  _ why  _ she does it, but she’s having fun, and that’s what seems important. Of course, this was limited to the days that Ruby wasn’t with her, god forbid Ruby started doing stunts like these too. That’s how Yang would end up doubly dead.

 

Blake would be there, though, chewing on her bottom lip, eyebrows knitting together as she’d quietly say, “I don’t think this is a good idea,” to Yang. 

 

To which Yang always just responded, “Watch.”

 

In an unsurprising turn of events, one day it is  _ not  _ a good idea. Ryan’s parents had left him home alone for the day, and he has a  _ pool.  _ Of course, word spreads through the neighborhood. Ruby just so happens to be on a playdate with Juane. Yang bikes her and Blake over there; Blake standing on the spokes on the back of Yang’s bike and wearing her bright yellow helmet.

 

They’ve barely even joined the crowd when dares start being thrown their way. Yang rolls her eyes at most of them. She was eleven, not two, give her something worth doing, until Ryan’s older brother, Cardin, fixes her with a challenging stare, standing over her, and says, “I bet you won’t jump off the roof into the pool.”

 

And, oh, they have a two story house, and that’s probably a very bad idea. Yang was smart, but this kid is bigger than her and taller than her and she hates how that makes unease settle in her gut.

 

“Forget the pool,” Yang says with a shrug of confidence. “I’ll jump on your front lawn from the roof.”

 

“Okay, no, let’s not,” Blake steps between them, grabbing Yang by the shoulders and backing her up. “That’s a bad idea, Yang.” And Yang could read the exasperation in her eyes, the exhausted,  _ did you really have to up the stakes?  _

 

Cardin laughs. “You gonna let your girlfriend tell you what to do?” he taunts, body leering towards her, reminding her of her still small stature. 

 

“I’m not her girlfriend,” Blake corrects quickly and Yang isn’t bothered by it, really, but the reminder gives her an extra ounce of gumption.

 

“So do I need to scale your drain pipe or what?”

 

In the end, they find a ladder to get Yang onto the lowest part of the roof, and she scampers to the top by herself the rest of the way.

 

Blake stands at the foot of the ladder, asking her not to do it, yells from the ground, waves her arms and threatens to call Yang’s dad. 

 

“Shut  _ up _ ,” one of the other kids says to Blake, shoving her shoulder. “This is going to be cool.”

 

Yang would have to kick his ass as soon as she was down from here. No one told her friend to shut up. And definitely, no one put their hands on her.

 

“YANG!” Blake shouts, hands cupped around her mouth to help her voice carry. “PLEASE.” 

 

The fear was something Yang could push through, even as the grassy lawn below was going in and out focus. The promise of pain wasn’t that big of a concern, she didn’t mind a little pain here and there, but Blake calling to her with that desperate twinge to her voice, not to mention that kid being rude to her, convinces Yang she should just come down and beat the snot out of him. 

 

As soon as she turns to climb down, she hears that same kid shout, “Look what you did, you filthy animal! You ruined it.” Yang sees fire. There’s nothing but heat and flames, and oh, there’s true and proper hatred in her veins right now. 

 

“WHAT DID YOU SAY TO HER,” she bellows from the roof. The kid’s eyes widen. He begins to back away, reaching for his red bike. “GET YOUR ASS BACK HERE!”

 

And she jumps right from the roof because he is going to get his ass kicked three times over. His blood was going to be staining this grass red for days to come. 

 

Except she jumps without thinking much about her landing, already focused on how she was going to sprint after him, and the earth greets her with a welcoming snap.

 

“Shit!” she yells, hands wrapping around her ankle before she’s pressing them against the ground in an attempt to push herself back up. “Get over here, you slut! I’m going to teach you-Agh!” she falls without ever taking a step. “Holy shit, Blake. Go catch that kid and bring him over here so I can beat his ass.”

 

“Yang, your leg is  _ broken _ ,” Blake says in a rush, hands steadying Yang as she tries to get up again. “Forget about some dumbass kid for a second.”

 

“I’m gonna kill him,” Yang vows, speaking through gritted teeth because she didn’t mind a little pain, but this was quickly turning into a lot. 

 

“No you’re not,” Blake sighs, hands pressing Yang back down.

 

“Fine,” she consents. “I’m gonna break his nose.” She whimpers, the pain shooting up her whole leg, the fire has dimmed from her bloodstream and is now gathered in her extremity. She could melt metal right now.

 

“Oh good,” Blake sighs, placing Yang’s head in her lap, brushing her hair back from her face. “Maybe we can get a twofer at the hospital.”

 

Yang’s crying, tears streaming down her face that she has no chance of holding back. She’s known a hell of a lot of pain in her years, but this one is a little different. She can’t fight it down, bite back the tears or the cries of anguish. “Don’t be sarcastic with me, Belladonna. I’m injured.”

 

Hands are wiping her face, Blake’s sleeve even running under her faucet of a nose. “I’ll save the ‘I told you so’ for after I sign your cast.” Yang mutters something about making sure it’s yellow while Blake screams for someone to call 911.

 

“No way!” Cardin demands as some kid pulls out his scroll. “I’m not taking the fall for bimbo Barbie over there.”

 

“Hey!” Blake shouts, her voice powerful, demanding. “You get me a freaking ambulance or so help me-”

 

“I’ll make you a deal,” Yang offers, proposing her ultimatum while the edges of the world go fuzzy. She loses consciousness with Blake’s hands clutching her tightly.

 

//

 

There are machines beeping and something cold pressed against Yang’s bare chest. Her eyes fly open, seeking out who was near her.

 

“Blake?” she asks out of instinct, moving to get up only to be met with a chorus of “No!” and hands pushing her back down.

 

The room comes into view, the beeping attached to a machine on the wall, a woman in a white coat standing over her, a man in blue scrubs at the bottom of her bed, holding her leg steady. Her leg that was in a bright...purple cast. What the hell, Blake. There’s a rainbow on the ceiling above her, monkeys and giraffes on the wall to her right. 

 

“You’re going to make me go grey in all of six months, kid,” her dad says next to her, pale as a ghost. 

 

Oh right. “Dad,” she offers him a grimace of a smile, pain starting to return along with her senses. “What brings you here?”

 

“Yang Xiao Long-”

 

“It’s the art, right?” she points to the rainbow ceiling. “It’s quality, really.”

 

In an attempt to brace herself for the verbal attack she’s soon to receive, she squeezes her eyes shut, but instead feels her dad’s warm arms wrapping around her, drawing her gently against him in a display of affection. Normally not her style, but she’d take it over the onslaught of ‘I’m disappointed’ statements that were sure to be heading her way.

 

“I really think you’re trying to kill me,” he says into her hair before releasing her. 

 

“It’s a long story?” she tries, holding her hands out in a shrug.

 

Tai looks unimpressed. “And I’ll be more than happy to hear the whole thing from start to finish later, trust me.”

 

The doctor and nurses ask her a whole bunch of questions, many of which make her roll her eyes. “No, I’m eleven. I wasn’t doing hallucinogenic drugs.”

 

“Of course not,” her dad chimes in. “She only jumps off of roofs in her  _ right  _ mind.”

 

Finally, they leave her alone with stuff running into the IV in her arm and a machine all hooked up to her chest and her foot resting on a pile of pillows. The first word she says when they’re gone, “Blake?” and her dad doesn’t even argue, just gets up, walks out the door and comes back thirty seconds later with Blake behind him. 

 

Her eyes scan Yang, going from her face to her leg and back again. “I’m  _ so  _ mad at you,” Yang says, and Blake looks horrified, so Yang quickly rushes on to add, “why the hell is my leg purple?”

 

The concern promptly shifts into laughter and then Blake’s arms are wrapped around Yang’s neck, and she knows immediately that Blake’s getting all teary and snotty against her hospital gown. Her dad keeps making all these quiet comments of, “Okay, but be careful of her leg,” and, “just don’t move her too much,” before giving up and falling back in his chair as Blake cries against Yang.

 

“You’re the stupidest person I have ever met,” Blake cries.

 

“I am the smartest person, and you know it,” Yang says, catching Blake’s parents hanging in the doorway in her periphery. 

 

Kali comes over, gently prying Blake from her vice grip and cupping Yang’s cheek with her hand. “That remains to be seen, young lady,” she says with a sigh. “What were you thinking?”

 

“She wasn’t!” Blake says, turning back to Yang with anger now. “You couldn’t have been more reckless if you tried, Yang.”

 

“If I recall,” Yang says, voice even. Blake was only mad because she was scared. It’d pass quickly. “I was defending  _ your  _ honor.”

 

Ghira extends a stuffed animal. “That’s why you get the bear,” he says, offering a conspiratorial wink. 

 

“You climbed up there to defend your own,” Blake argues with a pointed finger. “Because you’re stupid.”

 

Yang shrugs. “I prefer thrill seeker.”

 

“She’s going to kill me,” Tai says from his chair, hand running through his hair. “Stress kills. Isn’t that what they say?”

 

“We’re just glad you’re okay,” Kali insists. She places a gentle hand on Yang’s shoulder, crouching by her bed. “And thank you.”

 

“Don’t thank her!” Blake shouts. “She was bad. Ground her forever,” she says to Tai.

 

He laughs, mussing her hair. “Ground her forever as long as you can still see her, right?” 

 

“Obviously grounding doesn’t count me,” Blake says, rolling her eyes. She pulls the empty chair on the other side of Yang’s bed closer. The adults stare at her. “What? Someone has to watch her.”

 

“It went so well last time you were in charge,” Yang jokes, and Blake whacks her shoulder, a little more gentle than usual. Yang mock salutes with two fingers. “I meant sir, yes, sir!”

 

“What are we going to do with them,” Kali sighs, gentle smile finding its way to her face at their antics, at how happy her daughter was anytime she was even just talking about Yang.

 

Tai shakes his head. “I was thinking adoption might be a pretty good choice right about now.”

 

They don’t get Yang’s indignant, “Hey!” they’re expecting as she’s wrapped up in conversation with Blake, a smile on her face, finger poking her shoulder. It was pretty easy to tell where this was going. Even then, there was no way not to know.

 

\--

 

_ 17 _

 

The first time Blake returns to Yang’s house she feels more at home than when she settled back into her old bedroom. Nothing has changed really. The picture of her and Yang with their gapped tooth smiles still hung in the hallway, the cereal bowl she always used was still in the cabinet—even Tai was the same. 

 

He welcomes her back as if she had never left at all. He doesn’t ask her questions that are any different than before. He does watch his daughter with an extra close eye, makes her hug him before he leaves for work, texts her throughout the day. 

 

He knows Blake took a piece of his daughter with her. He doesn’t blame her. Blake knows what blame feels like and there is none to be found here. 

 

One of those early visits, Blake arrives before Yang has gotten back from her jog. She knocks on the door, and Tai opens it, invites her in. 

 

They sit awkwardly in the living room; small talk questions bled through quickly before Blake can’t take it anymore. There was no guilt to be found here, but there was plenty within herself. 

 

“I’m so sorry,” she says the words Yang refused to hear, rejected to accept even as their necessity swallowed Blake whole. 

 

He clears his throat, shifts in his chair and leans forward with his elbows on his knees. “Blake.” He stops, and she knows he’s attempting to read her, discern what she can handle. 

 

“Go ahead,” she urges him. “I can take it.” Probably not, but she needs to hear someone else see her for the truth, to agree that she had done ugly deeds, created disasters in her wake. She was a storm trembling the winds, stirring up the tornadoes until only fragments remains, until destruction had rung true.

 

He looks to the floor and sighs, runs a hand through his hair. “My house was a whole lot emptier without you, kid. I’m glad you’re back.”

 

“But-” she goes to protest. Someone give her the reality—no more coddling. 

 

The front door opens, and Yang bursts through, a spring still in her step even as sweat drips off of her. “Blake!” she says, voice all cheer and excitement. 

 

Tai ruffles her hair like he did when she was little. “I mean it, Blake.” Then he turns to his daughter, rolling his eyes and dramatically complaining about how she was always tracking mud all through the house with this ridiculous habit of hers. 

 

They banter for a minute before Yang shifts her attention to Blake, grabs her hand and drags her up the stairs, yammering on about what they can do today. Tai’s smile follows them and the comprehension of what he’d meant  connects before Blake reaches the top of the stairs.

 

\--

 

_ 24 _

 

It wasn’t exactly a weekend ideal for going out. Saturday and Sunday weren’t intended for rest days. Ironwood wasn’t taking them off when court would be back in session Monday morning so neither would Blake or Yang. It was two more days to prepare, and they weren’t about to miss out on the opportunity.

 

That doesn’t stop Yang from declaring a night out is in order. “Not to Uncle Qrow’s,” she says when she brings it up to Ruby that morning. “He’ll be on high alert right now. Let’s go to the bar on the other side of town. They get pretty decent bands on the weekends.”

 

Ruby and Weiss shrug, though Weiss does throw Yang a look, an obvious question written on her face. No one says a damn thing to Yang until that night when Yang, as casually as possible, mentions that she had invited Blake.

 

There’s a hesitant look on Ruby’s face from the second Yang states the plan. She bites her lip and holds back an, “Are you sure?” just before it can slip out. There are more obvious questions; Yang has plenty of her own. Maybe it was a bad idea. Maybe Yang didn’t have it in her to care anymore. 

 

No one else questions the text that’s sent out. It’s Friday. The weekend is here. Why not go out? It wasn’t that uncommon to anyone else’s perception. The unusuality exists in Blake Belladonna stepping through the door in a dark purple halter top, shorts adorning her legs, tights underneath, black heeled boots on her feet. There’s a necklace dangling from her neck, falling just between her breasts and silver studs in her ears. She walks in with self-assurance exuding from her step, surety in how her eyes scan the place.

 

No one stands a chance of looking anywhere but at Blake. There’s a history of questions buried just beneath her skin, a list of answers unattainably tucked away. 

 

She saunters up to the bar; there’s no other way to describe it, leans against the counter just next to Yang, bare arms in front of her as the bartender approaches. She’s draped in confidence, cloaked in determination.

 

“I’ll have a hard cider,” she says to the bartender, eyes flicking to Yang before continuing. “And she’ll take a...Long Island Iced Tea,” Blake says with a flippant gesture towards Yang, and a challenging glance sent her way. 

 

Yang doesn't back down. 

 

“Little bit of every alcohol, huh?” she asks as soon as the bartender steps away. “I see how it is.” 

 

Maybe Blake was a glutton for punishment; maybe she liked making everyone’s life more difficult. She was less a curse of bad luck as she was summoning from the ground beneath her, her blood singing for destruction. 

 

Yang was no lightweight, but she also wasn't one to give up. Every time Blake orders a drink and asks if she wants another, Yang agrees. They keep at this until Yang’s eyes are more heavily hooded, the challenge dimmed to a flirtatious look poorly disguised. 

 

The flaw in the plan is undoubtedly that Blake is matching her, drink for drink. 

 

It only takes two before she switches off of cider, ordering her own hard liquor, knocking back tequila shots with a squirt of lime in her mouth, tongue darting out to lick her lips, eyes holding Yang’s, making sure she was watching every movement.

 

They don’t need to be doing this, something in the back of Blake’s mind says. But they need to do  _ something. _ She is drowning, has been maybe for the two weeks she’s been back, or for the two years she’s spent running away. There’s no way to know, not right now. But her lungs are burning, her heart seizing in her chest. There are oxygen and sunlight just out of reach, and her hands are so tired of not grabbing it, not holding on with an unrelenting grasp. There’s only a few shots running through her bloodstream before she’s asking what the  _ fuck  _ has taken so long. 

 

The bathroom’s off to the side, just down a dim hallway. It always is in a place like this. Blake excuses herself from the group with a hazy head, feet unsteady, room swimming. Her lips are numb; the rest of her is very much not. 

 

As she goes by she runs two fingers against Yang’s lower back, right along the section where her shirt has ridden up, bare skin pressed against the tips of Blake’s fingers for a flash of a second. It’s not nearly long enough. It’s a signal, an invitation. 

 

No one follows her. She leaves the bathroom door unlocked and counts to ten. 

 

Yang’s there before she reaches seven.

 

They have never held back, not with each other. Time hasn’t changed that, distance has had no lasting alteration.

 

Yang presses her mouth, hot and wet and needing, against Blake’s. Her kisses are sloppy but desperate, tongue running along Blake’s bottom lip, into her mouth, lips traveling down to suck on her pulse points, make her legs quiver without touching more than the back of her head, hands buried in her hair. Blake has forgotten what it’s like to breathe; it’s slipped her mind what it feels like to be encompassed by the sun. Her hands reach out, grabbing the front of Yang’s shirt and pulling her closer.  _ More. More. More. _

 

“Demanding,” Yang murmurs between kisses, lips moving along Blake’s collarbone, fingers brushing along the edge of Blake’s shorts, ghosting over the thin material of her tights.

 

Blake has always had loose lips after a couple of drinks. “Can you blame me?” Blake asks, head tilting back. She wants to kiss back but can’t move, rendered entirely frozen by her desire to memorize every press of lips to her skin, that same worshipping of her body that Yang had always so freely offered, left at her feet without question. 

 

Yang never allowed sex to be merely sex. It was passion. With Yang, sex was never even half a step away from love. The two were tethered together.

 

“I’m not fucking you against the wall of a bar bathroom,” Blake eventually slurs out, drunk more on the awareness of Yang’s hands all over her than any damn tequila shot. There was no way to know why Blake had come here in the first place, what it was that ordained her to spell out her own demise, order it at the counter over and over until she was high on yellow, intoxicated with purple, too drunk to remember the red.

 

“Who said a damn word about  _ you  _ fucking  _ me _ ?” Yang asks, thigh pressing between Blake’s, moans meeting in unison. 

 

Typical. 

 

Blake takes her hands from where they’re buried in Yang’s hair, running them along Yang’s back. She lets her fingers slide up the edge of Yang’s dress, along her thigh, reaching the hem of her underwear. “You haven’t changed,” Blake murmurs, the room is spinning and there’s no way of telling up from down right now. “Always acting like you have total control. Like I couldn’t unwind you with a singular touch.” Her fingers slide just inside Yang’s underwear, come away wet. 

 

Yang trembles against her. “Fuck you, Belladonna.”

 

“I was hoping that was the plan all along.”

 

“ _ Fuck. You.”  _ She presses their lips together, hands running along Blake’s body, frustrated with the tight fit of her shorts. Her eyes are fixed on the scroll that she holds behind Blake’s head.

 

“The hell are you doing?” Blake asks when she sees it in her periphery. Put your hands on  _ me.  _ Let the presence of me consume  _ you. _

 

“Getting us a goddamn Lyft.” 

 

Yang pushes Blake against the wall, fingers of her free hand undoing the button of her shorts, hand slipping in, running along her underwear, shivering at how wet she finds her. 

 

Damn, Lyft would mean a wait. Blake was just drunk enough that she’d decided she was never waiting again. Two years was long enough. Two years had broken her apart. Two years was nothing when Yang was this close to her, mere moments away from being inside of her, apart of her. Just like they’d always been, halfway to completed, submitting to the fact that they could so easily melt into one another, fuse to one. 

 

“Think you can make it that long?” Blake teases, fingers pressing against her, finding satisfaction in the tremble of Yang’s muscles, the groan slipping past her lips.

 

“Blake.” Her name is uttered like a goddamn prayer. 

 

“Blake.” Her name is held with reverence. 

 

“Blake.” Her name is murmured like she is a god to be worshipped. 

 

Someone ought to tell Yang that Blake was closer to the devil, their own personal demon right now. She was going to be their undoing. Just as she had been before. A tendency never sacrificed, a habit never broken.

 

Thirty minutes later when her back is pressed into the mattress, and her eyes roll to the back of her head, her muscles tightening, trembling in anticipation, Blake can’t help but think that maybe there was never anything to be undone. “ _ Yang _ .” They were already unspooled threads, ready to tangle themselves back together.

 

It doesn’t take long to figure out they’d never separated to begin with.

 

\--

 

_ 18 _

 

The philosophy elective is actually the one Yang has the least interest in, but Blake wants to take it, and they don’t get many classes together. She turns to Yang with a pouty lip as they sit in the library, frantically attempting to get signed up for classes for their second semester. “Please? By next year we won’t get to take a thing together.”

 

“I hate philosophy,” Yang declares, even as she types in the same course code showing on Blake’s computer. “I’m cheating off of all your tests. No negotiations.”

 

The class ends up being worse than imagined. The professor is some old guy with a droning, dry tone and an antiquated point of view. He’s not looking for any interesting debates or deep introspection. The first quiz they take asks mundane questions like who Socrates spoke to on the steps in the first chapter. The questions don’t vary outside of those basic, unphilosophical facts.

 

Before every class Yang groans, complaining loudly to Blake about how this was  _ all her fault  _ and when Yang has turned up dead from boredom it is entirely her doing. 

 

“Shut up and take your essay, Xiao Long.” She holds out the stapled together papers, Yang’s name displayed proudly on the front. “It’s B material, and anything higher would end with you being investigated since you spend half of the class asleep.”

 

They sit in the back together, Blake usually reading a novel and Yang folding pieces of notebook paper into footballs to punt with her fingers when the professor’s back is turned. 

 

Blake’s writing in purple pen on Yang’s notebook, little doodles and declarations of her presence on every single page. Yang smiles behind her hand, knowing she’ll be writing in the margins of Blake’s musings for weeks to come. 

 

The first time anything interesting happens is when a girl with dark red hair raises her hand prominently in the air as the teacher drones on. “I actually had some additional thoughts on the Parcae,” the student says, voice official and steady as she cuts the man off mid-sentence.

 

He looks up in surprise, eyes blinking. “Uh, yes Miss…”

 

“Pyrrha,” she supplies before pushing on. “The Parcae in Roman mythology were apart of spinning the threads of fate,” she states. “Theoretically, they pre-determined the paths individuals would take. This concept of the possibility of free-will being disregarded is mirrored in some of Plato’s statements made through Socrates.” She turns in her seat, facing the class. “Socrates said in chapter 13 that our actions are based on our beliefs and our beliefs have been formed out of knowledge, thus implying that our actions are entirely sustained through our knowledge. Does this suggest that free-will is removed as he states that we then cannot act against our knowledge at this point? If so how does it play into the Parcae and the threads of fate?”

 

Yang’s eyebrows raise as she looks to Blake. “Is that gonna be on the next test?” she whispers as the teacher searches for a response. 

 

“Contradictorily,” Pyrrha starts again in response to whatever the teacher begins saying. “Fate and destiny are two completely different concepts. Fate remains rooted in the present whereas destiny is about the future, the destination.”

 

“I think,” Blake chimes in, surprising Yang. “I think destiny is more of a construct of free will whereas fate disputes it.”

 

“How so?” Yang questions, more interested in a conversation with her friend then joining a philosophical debate with her class. 

 

“Well, fate is about the present and how individual choices bring you to a specific, present scenario. So, theoretically, our choices being made will change what our fates are along the way, they adapt with our choices, but our fate is co-dependent on our decisions.” Blake’s talking to Yang, but the other kids in the class are leaning in to hear better. “Destiny is like, you’re going to end up there no matter what, no matter the path you take or how far off the trail you go.” She stops, eyes holding Yang’s, teeth digging into her bottom lip. “Destiny means you end up where you’re meant to go—no matter how much you fight against it, no matter how much you screw up.”

 

“So in that case,” some other kid pipes up, but Yang tunes him out. She’s pretty sure Blake does as well. 

 

“Destiny, huh?” she asks, chin falling into her palm as she holds Blake’s gold eyes, catches herself picking out flecks of lightness  buried within. 

 

Blake swallows, fingers twisting the end of her purple pen as she holds Yang’s stare. “I’m just calling it like I see it,” Blake whispers in response.

 

Yellow and purple flowers braided into hair and the hot sun beating down on bare arms, uncovered shoulders. Yang’s transported back to a whole other time, an entirely different life. 

 

“Destiny,” Yang says, head nodding. Soulmates, she thinks, forcing her eyes to the front of the class with a desperate hope that her heart will calm when she looks away. It doesn’t.

 

\--

 

_ 24 _

 

Blake is gone before the sun rises. 

 

She pulls her shirt on, slips her underwear and shorts up, tights forgotten, and zips her boots before Yang’s breathing has even returned to normal. 

 

Yang doesn’t ask for Blake to stay, doesn’t offer for her to.

 

Blake doesn’t give her a chance to do so.

 

The morning comes with a headache pounding behind her eyes, a flipping of her stomach. It’s Saturday morning, and they still have a meeting with Ironwood. Two more days of preparation. Two more chances to figure out what the hell they were doing, how they were going to win.

 

Yang has never felt more like she’s lost.

 

The apartment is empty. No judgmental eyes from Weiss. No questions from Ruby. Yang is alone, and it hurts more than the relief she expected to feel. It’d be easier if there were a fight to pick, someone to roll her eyes at, a reminder that they’d fucked up coming from someone other than herself.

 

Sunglasses and Tylenol are the two saving graces of the morning. Yang walks to the office, craving the extra time to find her common sense, to convince herself she hadn’t failed colossoally, to determine how she should broach seeing Blake again.

 

Morning afters were always messy. 

 

They just never had been between the two of them. It wasn’t their style. 

 

Yang doesn’t just walk. She walks slow, waits for the green signals even when there’s no traffic, steps to the side and pauses to send a text back to Ren though it’s nothing urgent. There’s dread in every footfall. 

 

Ironwood beats them both today. He’s not impressed when Yang gets there, at least beating Blake.

 

“You know we only have two days to-”

 

“Yes,” Yang cuts him off before he can get going, keeping her sunglasses on. “Trust me. I know.”

 

He shuts up.

 

Blake gets there twenty minutes later. She looks more put together. No sunglasses, hair fixed just right, a cup of tea in hand. She sits on the opposite side of the room, like Yang had done the very first day. She’s putting the most possible space between them. 

 

Ironwood looks between them and evaluates, seems to take in their body language and their positioning and piece together a story they don’t want to read. 

 

“I’m learning something in this trial,” he says before getting on their cases, before reminding them about posture and eye movements and tone. They don’t answer him, don’t look at him or each other or anything besides the floor beneath their feet and the smooth, glossed wood under their hands. “You can’t help people who don’t want to help themselves.”

 

The statement gives Yang pause, makes her look up, eyes falling on Blake naturally, instinctually. “We’re here, okay?”

 

Ironwood shakes his head, sighs. It’s the same rotation every single day, the same exasperation and frustration poorly disguised, barely hidden. “It’s really not,” he answers as he sits at the head of the table. “Let’s get started.”

 

//

 

“So last night-”

 

“Shut up,” Blake cuts Sun off before he can get started.

 

“You were banging on the door like a banshee at four in the morning.” It was definitely in his top five list of worst ways to be woken up. “Care to explain where you were until then?”

 

Blake’s head hits the counter, the sharp pains reverberating, reminding her just why she was in agony. She wanted to live in this suffering for as long and as completely as possible to teach her damn self a lesson. “No.”

 

“So Yang then?”

 

“I fucking hate you.”

 

He pats her back, puts a cup of coffee in front of her. He tried. She had to give him points for trying. “Have you ever considered just accepting the word inevitable into your vocabulary, Blake?”

 

“I’ve considered accepting the concept of punching you in the face.”

 

He tsks. “You’ve been spending too much time with her already.”

 

Blake doesn’t say that a single second was too much time, more than she can handle, more than she can swallow down without the desire fighting its way right back up, the urge grabbing her tight and not letting go. 

 

“You’re telling me.”

 

\--

 

_ 19 _

 

Transitions aren’t supposed to be this easy. That’s what Blake thinks when she falls into bed beside Yang, when their lips find each other out of instinct, drawn together without thought or effort or searching. 

 

There were no awkward, flushing faces or eyes darting away from uncertain meetings. Instead, it was just the release of every inhibited desire at once. If Blake wanted to reach forward and run her fingers along Yang’s arm, she did. If Yang saw how the afternoon light caught in Blake’s eyes and was overwhelmed with a need to demonstrate how beautiful she thought Blake was, she leaned forward and kissed her—no more holding back, no more hiding.

 

Their lives were already intertwined in every way possible, a complicated stitch repeated over and over for years on end so no matter what thread was pulled it only further tightened. 

 

It really is no different now. They still eat their lunch together on the grass of the quad on Thursday afternoons; breakfasts were expected Monday mornings in Yang’s dorm room (pop tarts and energy drinks) and Wednesdays in the cafeteria. Tuesday was when Yang had a full class schedule, and Blake met her outside of her two pm statistics course to walk across campus with her for her three o’ clock differential equations. 

 

Every weekend has always been spent together, from the end of Blake’s morning psych course until Monday morning when they both roll out of Yang’s bed. 

 

So nothing changes, not really.

 

The only things that change are how the colors shine a little brighter, how Blake no longer feels like her heart is suffocating from within her chest, desperate to be set free and reach where it belonged. It was finally there. 

 

Weiss doesn’t connect the dots on her own. Maybe it’s because she isn’t interested in either of them enough to notice the difference. Probably it’s because the actual shift in behavior is so miniscule it doesn’t even blip on her radar. They kiss right in front of her, and she just rolls her eyes. “Is there anything you two don’t do together?” she demands when they’re mid-conversation about their plans to go out for tea bags and Q-tips.

 

Yang pretends to think, a finger tapping against her chin, looking off at a blank corner of the room. “Not if we can help it,” she answers with a shrug, legs shifting beneath Blake’s as Yang wrapped her arms around Blake’s waist, pulling her down to rest against her chest. 

 

“Doing things together is what couples do, after all,” Blake adds on, waiting to see if Weiss reacts, cares.

 

Weiss’ eyes narrow in response, squinting down at her textbook with narrowed brows and a pinched up expression before she looks up, analyzing Blake and Yang and the fact that they look exactly the same as always and yet different, easier. “So you  _ are  _ together.” It’s not a question.

 

“We are now,” Yang corrects.

 

“You always were,” Weiss says with a sigh and a roll of her eyes. They both go to protest, mouths open, Yang pointing a finger in her direction. “Friends don’t cuddle a minimum of three nights a week.”

 

Yang hmphs, pressing her cheek against the top of Blake’s head, nose burying into her hair, breathing in the warmth and flowers and home just a little bit stronger. “Good friends do,” she argues half-heartedly. 

 

“Good friends in relationships,” Weiss mutters. They don’t argue anymore.

 

\--

 

_ 24 _

 

“Last day of prep,” Blake says as Yang settles next to her. It seemed silly to walk to the other side of the room today. Blake wonders if she will survive the day without reaching out to her, without holding on with all she has to reclaim part of what they had Friday night, what they had two years ago...ten. 

 

She folds her hands together on top of the table. 

 

“Yep,” Yang says, tone flat and dry. 

 

“Do you think we’ll win?”

 

Yang turns her head, holds Blake’s stare and Blake can see the answer buried in her eyes. The answer is thrumming in her blood; it is held in her chest. The answer breaks free with every beat of her heart, every pang of anguish that courses through her. 

 

“I think we lost a long damn time ago,” Yang says, submitting to the unnecessity of saying it for the sake of having something to say at all.

 

“Yeah,” Blake agrees. 

 

When she thinks of losing she doesn’t think of blood or a blade in her side or red dirt in her sneakers. Losing was two years spent without lilac eyes, citrus and smoke, laughter and warmth and the only place where her heart beat steadily. Loss was never getting it back again. 

 

Maybe she couldn’t even blame Adam for just how much they have lost. Maybe it was on her. 

 

“I guess we did.”

  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this took a bit longer than usual. I'm sick with the plague, work has been literal insanity, and I have my final paper due in three days. So in summary this chapter has been edited (twice) but I still feel like it's a bit of a mess. I want to post the next chapter a lot sooner though cause this angst needs a break. As always, thanks for reading and all of your reviews. I know the angst isn't like, lessening necessarily, but there's a forward progression and that counts for something. Right?


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay so a bit of a trigger warning for the start of this chapter. It's a scene between Blake and Adam so suffice to say there's some emotional manipulation and a little bit of violence. So if any of that could be triggering to you then you might want to skip ahead to the following scene!

_17_

 

After the interaction with Sun, Yang is embedded into Blake’s mind. She gets flashes. There’s strobe lights of golden hair in the sunlight, a pulse-quickening within her throat, her wrists, her chest. It’s four years later, and she’s been fighting every second of it. It’s four years later, and Blake misses Yang just the same, like she misses herself. Maybe the absence is one and the same.

 

Now that the seed has been planted, there’s no stopping it from sprouting. It grows even as she tries to cover it from the light, climbs and climbs no matter how much she holds back the water and nutrients. By all means, it shouldn’t keep reaching upwards, spanning outwards, but the idea has entered her mind. It is enticing her, begging her.

 

The waves on the coast of Patch are calling her home, the force of the tide drifting her back. It’s not quite a riptide, she can swim against the current, but she’s tired and bruised, and there’s a lighthouse waiting for her on the shore, constantly bright and burning.

 

But then there’s Adam. Sometimes it’s when he stands over her that she feels sure she can’t leave. She is indebted to him. She is to fulfill her purpose with him, for him. He has suffered enough, and she is the remedy. She is the constant.

 

It’s harder still when he’s standing beside her, when they’re equals. What they have built is stronger than a budding plant. It could rise out of the seas and remain against the waves as a stronghold, a fortress. Right?

 

There’s less surety when her feet come out from beneath her, certainty wavering when her body shakes in anticipation, in fear, in disgust.

 

This isn’t what she came here for; it’s not why she stayed. The promises that the pain that’s been caused, the lives being taken, how it’s all temporary, seems less and less true as the days and weeks and months drag on. The cruelty only grows, never shrinks. Eventually, she can’t help but wonder if it will ever end. Or if she’ll simply always be apart of it.

 

Sometimes the bruises last a little longer than others. Occasionally her cheek takes more time for the swelling to go down. When she catches herself in a mirror, there’s a moment when she wonders where this person has come from, how her thirteen-year old-self has shifted into this. The difference four years can make has never been so apparent.

 

She’s become the right-hand leader of a subset mission group. People look to her for guidance, base their actions off of hers. Sometimes Adam coaches her on what to say before she gets up in front of the crowds, reminds her how to motivate. Other times she jumps into it, like leading was her natural intuition, as if she wasn’t made for the following she’d spent the beginning portion of her life doing. She stood tall, determined as her voice rang out to reach the masses. The group rallies behind her. They rally _with_ her.

 

It was intoxicating. That part she understood.

 

But when she was watching from behind—seeing as bodies hit the ground, listening as screams of distress ring out—her determination filtered away. It washed clean, running down the sides of streets and through to the sewer below, the gutters clogged with the choices she’d made in recent years and how she has stuck so resolutely to them.

 

With her scroll activity closely monitored, Blake doesn’t know how to reach out to anyone outside of the camp. Sun is gone, his offer for freedom vanishing the second she pushed him out, threatened his safety.

 

In the mess hall, she eats with Ilia. During the day she trains with others her age. At night she’s in bed beside Adam. He dictates her schedule, tells her what to eat, orders what her workouts will consist of. “I want you to be strong,” he would say when his hands were too heavy to fight off. “I want you to stand with me and not be pushed down,” he would insist while she begged him to stop.

 

All she ever feels is weak, incompetent. She can’t run because she would tire halfway out. There’s nowhere to go, no one who would forgive her, no one that would still want her.

 

When she brings up college, Adam scoffs at her. “What the fuck would you need that for?” he demands in the middle of their sparring. She’s doing her best to block his moves and counterattack, but he’s too fast, like always. He gets in more hits than she does, more force behind his fists than she could muster within hers. Four years and she was no stronger, hardly any faster.

 

“Well, one day,” she starts, breath heaving as he comes at her again, the blunt side of his blade smacking against her thigh. She winces. “Isn’t the idea that we’ll achieve equality?” He laughs, motioning for her to draw her weapon, obtain her stance. “That’s our purpose, isn’t it?”

 

His eyebrows raise at her demanding tone, posture switching out of the attack stance he’d slipped into. He was taller than her now, towering over head while she stood in her bare feet, toes curling beneath her. “Don’t be naive, Blake,” he says like she’s stupid for even thinking of the potential. “Haven’t you learned that humans will never allow for equality?”

 

“That’s not true,” she answers immediately. That’s why she was here. It’s the whole reason she kept at this day after day. “We are fighting to make them see us as such.”

 

He rolls his eyes at her. “Really, my love? Are you that pitifully obtuse?” Her hand tightens around the handle of her blade, stance lowering. She knew how he liked to fight, get her off guard when he’s seemingly off his and then attack, move in quick while her defenses are down, so the sparring is over before it’s even begun.

 

She launches herself at him. He deflects her with ease. “Then what are we doing, Adam? If you’re so convinced this war has no better ending for us than how we started?”

 

The blade of his sword swings forward while she’s still recovering from her last attack and she moves at the last minute to stop it from making contact. “We’re making them listen,” he grunts, teeth bared. “Whether they take us seriously is their choice, one that they have made time and time again.” The steel of their blades crashes together repeatedly, echoing through the tall, empty walls of the sparring room. “We’re going to make that choice for them one way or the other.”

 

The words feel like a threat, a guarantee of something more dark and festering than simply taking out the guards of unjust Faunus prisons, more vile than torturing the slave drivers in Atlas. “What does that mean?” she demands of him while keeping her feet moving quickly, shifting entirely to defense, to avoidance. He was moving faster than she could, his blows heavy and requiring time for her to recover from that she didn’t have the luxury of.

 

“It means, I’m going to win,” he tells her, “by whatever means necessary.” She falters at the statement, and his blade slides just below her ribs, cutting through the material of her shirt and his sword coming away with the tinge of blood on the edge. She doesn’t feel the sliver of skin he’d stripped away for several seconds. “And it means you’re going to stop questioning me.”

 

She flinches, hand going to her side. The cut was shallow, only superficial flesh sliced away. He turns away from her, shaking his head in disappointment that she couldn’t put up a better fight, that after years she was still just as pathetic and weak as she’d been at thirteen. “Hey!” she demands of him, her weapon dropping to the ground and ringing like a bell as it kissed the floor. “You said that we were fighting for ourselves! That  we would be seen _and_ heard until everyone was listening.” She presses her hand into his shoulder, turning him towards her. The cut in her side protests against her stretching her hand up. She ignores it. “Look at me!”

 

He turns, and in the same second his hand raises, slapping against her face, the the sharp _crack_ resounds, shakes the walls, trembles the ground beneath her. “Who do you think you are?” he demands, a hand coming up and pushing roughly against Blake’s shoulder and watches her give in, crumpling to the floor, his blade still clutched in his other hand. “I’m doing what this group needs. I’m making the hard choices, Blake.” His free hand reaches up, pulling his mask from his eyes, the branding shining down at her until she’s filled with shame, pity for what he’s lost, what he’s been forced to live through. “You don’t have the strength to make the hard choices because you never had to live through it,” he tells her, eyes fixed on her in a hard, angry stare. “Don’t you dare question mine.”

 

But we’re equals; she wants to argue with him. We’re fighting this together. The unity is what had drawn her in, the loyalty rooting her to the spot. He spits at her feet, sheathing his blade as he turns away from her. “I would watch yourself,” he threatens as he turns into the shadows, towards the door. “If you don’t stand beside me, Blake, then you won’t stand at all.”

 

He leaves her on the ground, quivering, the anger fighting its way against the fear. She stays on the floor, body curling around itself as a hand presses to her side, holding pressure against the wound and waiting to find the strength to get up.

 

\--

 

_24_

 

It’s only been five days. There’s no reason Yang should expect the courtroom to be any different, to feel new, but it’s a momentary shock when she steps into the room, swears in, looks out at the people gathered, and everything is the same. Weiss is even still dressed in blue.

 

Character witnesses start it off. Ilia climbs the stands, states her name, answers the questions. Yang had met Ilia twice. Once at a college party and the second time when she’d been running from the White Fang herself, warning Blake that Adam wasn’t happy, wasn’t right.

 

She tells that story now, about how she’d been apart of the White Fang even longer than Blake. She had seen different leaders come and go, different tactics used.

 

Things with Adam were getting worse when Ilia left. He was lead by a drive for destruction, justice an entirely new concept in his mind. Ilia is asked how she knew Adam was potentially going to pursue Blake.

 

“He told me,” she says, shoulders stiff, eyes downcast. “I was moving up in the ranks myself. At the time I was quickly becoming a leader of my own in the group. Some nights he would lose himself in a fit of anger. Blake leaving...it unhinged him further.”

 

“Further?” Ironwood presses, hands clasped behind his back. “Can you elaborate?”

 

Ilia’s eyes jump to Blake; Yang can’t resist doing the same.

 

Blake’s hands grip the armrests of the chair, knuckles white, breath caught in her chest as she offers Ilia a singular nod. Her eyes fall to where Adam sits.

 

If Yang were a bigger person, a little more prone to self-preservation, she would turn back to the front, listen to Ilia’s testimony, remember her own pain that was present in this room, her own suffering.

 

She wouldn’t be herself, though.

 

Yang reaches her right arm out, two fingers tapping the back of Blake’s hand. An immediate reaction, eyes from Adam to Yang in an instant. “It’s okay,” Yang whispers so quietly she might as well be mouthing the words.

 

In the stand, Ilia continues, laying out pieces of Blake’s past, of her relationship with Adam, of the outsider’s viewpoint and how Adam spiraled. He became mad with desire to reclaim Blake as his own.

 

“It’s okay,” Blake mouths back, chest releasing with an exhale.

 

“You’re safe.”

 

“I’m safe.”

 

Their mantra was spoken so often in whispered breaths, with lips buried in hair, bodies pressed close together, sheets tangled around them. It was just like all of the other memories that stacked on top of one another, growing and growing and never toppling down, never dropping off.

 

“I’m here,” Yang says, hand clenching tight around Blake’s, eyes holding steady.

 

“You’re here.”

 

There are some things that never changes. Not really.

 

\--

 

_17_

 

Yang’s scroll rings when they’re re-packing boxes, sorting between what was worth taking to college and what was entirely unnecessary. Yang was of the opinion that a lot of Blake’s stuff was unnecessary, laying on the floor twenty minutes in and flipping through some of her old notebooks, reading scribbled notes in the margin.

 

“Hello,” Yang answers her scroll with a bored tone. She sits up a moment later. “I told you not to call me,” her voice is hushed and urgent.

 

Blake watches her and the debate between the necessity of her silver heels forgotten with the sudden tension radiating from Yang.

 

“No, I don’t care.” Her eyes fly to Blake’s, a mask of worry over her usual open stares. “Just leave me alone.” She drops the call, scroll thrown across the room where it lands amongst a pile of books Blake had yet to sort through. She takes a grounding breath, pushing up from her spot on the floor to the other side of Blake’s bed, bending down like there was an urgent need to pack up discarded socks.

 

“Yang…”Blake says, standing and following her over. “Hey-”

 

“I don’t want to talk about it,” Yang cuts her off, turning from her, facing the bookshelf, eyes scanning the books. “I’m fine.”

 

Blake almost gives up, but then she steps in front of Yang, hands grabbing her shoulders. “Talk to me,” she whispers. She knows what it’s like to need someone not just to be willing to listen but to make you talk.

 

Yang looks off to the side, bites the inside of her cheek as she draws in a shaky breath. “She started trying to get in contact with me a few years ago,” she says, eyes on the open closet. “The first time it happened I…”

 

“What?” Blake pushes, knowing who they’re talking about without Yang needing to specify.

 

“It was that night I called you from my dad’s scroll,” she admits. Blake feels the admission in her gut, burrowing deep, ragged claws pulling her apart from the inside out. “I didn’t know who else to talk to and...well you know.”

 

It isn’t the first time that Blake wonders how Yang could ever forgive her; how they could ever be back here again. The call had come three weeks after Blake had blocked Yang’s number, her scroll regularly checked for obedience. “Yang, I’m so s-”

 

“Stop.” Yang sighs, shaking Blake’s hands from her shoulders, running a hand down her face. “I didn’t want to tell you that because I didn’t want you feeling guilty.”

 

There’s no way to tell her that she doesn’t. Blake feels a pit of guilt growing inside of her, and every time she considers all the ways she’s disappointed Yang she rains nutrients down on it. So she nods to Yang, expressing that she understands. “Okay, just talk,” Blake offers. “I won’t apologize.”

 

Yang sits on the edge of Blake’s unmade bed, picking at the rumpled sheet next to her. “She started calling me, texting me. I don’t really know how she got my number.” Blake sits next to her, close enough to offer comfort while still trying to give space. “She said she wanted to talk to me. I...didn’t want to listen.”

 

“Can’t blame you,” she interjects, pressing her lips together before she adds anything else.

 

“Yeah, so, I tried to ignore her. Like, hard.” That was the opposite of Yang’s tactics. She took everything head on, every battle that came her, or Blake’s, way was one she was already prepared for. “I didn’t want whatever she was trying to offer.” She laughs, a short, bitter burst before crossing her arms over her chest, eyes on the floor. “Not that she was offering much.”

 

Blake puts an arm around Yang’s shoulder, pulls her close, presses her face into the crown of Yang’s head, breathing her in. No apologies allowed, no guilt permitted. Blake’s only got one thing left to say. “I love you.”

 

\--

 

_24_

 

Blake’s parents come up behind her as the bang of the gavel is still bouncing off the walls, announcing the end of another day. “Want to get some dinner?” her mom asks, hand on Blake’s shoulder. So gentle, like she thinks Blake is going to break in a fraction of a second.

 

But Yang’s at her other side, not touching, but close, her presence a warmth radiating into Blake’s blood. “Ironwood mentioned something about working out a few last minute details for tomorrow,” Yang says, looking more to Blake’s parents than to Blake herself. “If you’re up for it.” This she says with a finger on Blake’s arm, brushing for a singular second.

 

“Of course,” she answers, turning to her parents and allotting for the obligatory goodbye hug. They always acted like each goodbye was going to be for yet another lifetime. The running has broken them as well. “Breakfast in the morning?” she says to them, knowing they’ll agree. They take whatever opportunity she gives them.

 

So many pieces left behind her, a trail of brokenness in her wake like breadcrumbs in the woods.

 

“I have my bike,” Yang says. “If you need a ride.”

 

It’d be so easy to follow them all right back to where she’d come from, where she’d started.

 

“Sure, thanks.”

 

Or maybe she’d be swallowed whole.

 

It’s hard to say whether or not she cares which it is right now.

 

“Ironwood didn’t ask to meet,” Yang admits when they’re a few steps out of the building, walking up the stairs of the parking garage. “I just...I didn’t-” she sighs, hand reaching up to push hair back from her face. “Figured your parents weren’t quite who you’d want to hang out with tonight. I didn’t mean to-”

 

“No, you’re right,” Blake cuts her off before she rambles on any longer.

 

Neither of them comments on how the assumption means that Yang has deduced Blake would rather be with her. No one breathes a word about how she’s hit the nail right on the head.

 

Yang’s bike is the same, a blend of orange and yellow hues, the purple streaks that Blake had jokingly talked about adding, the same joke that the next day saw Yang with a mini can of spray paint and a cardboard stencil, still etched into the side.

 

Blake’s fingers reach out, running along the designs.

 

“I thought about painting over it,” Yang says, unprecedented, leaning against her bike, facing Blake.

 

A light bulb overhead flickers and, even though Adam’s in a bright orange jumpsuit in the back of a van, Blake still shivers. She was unable to believe she was ever anything but on the edge of danger, on the precipice of being a victim of her vulnerability once more. “Why didn’t you?”

 

Yang shrugs, reaches for her helmet and holds it out to Blake. “Lazy, I guess.”

 

“Right,” Blake says as opposed to calling Yang out on her lie. She slips the helmet on, ears flattening against her skull so it fits. “Where are we going?”

 

Yang throws a leg over her bike, revs the engine. “Hadn’t gotten that far.”

 

The internal war is obvious, the bloodshed of resolve on the ground in front of them, the bones of restraint decaying. Desire and want and a deep ache of missing were in the before them; sword raised high in the air in a victory cry.

 

Blake doesn’t ask another question. She throws a leg over, an arm wrapping around Yang’s waist, the air between them reacting to the energy that’s created, the current of electricity tracing its way through—building and surging.

 

“Well let’s fucking go then,” Blake says in Yang’s ear, not missing the quirk of lips in response.

 

“That’s the spirit, babe.”

 

The past finds them whether or not they’re looking for it. It’s impossible to stay away from something you’ve never left, something that is just as entangled with the present as it has always been, a part of herself that can’t be left behind. These pieces have been etched into her being, carved into the chambers of her heart and stenciled into her skin.

 

There’s no need for breadcrumbs when there’s a light leading her back, a string pulling her forward, a realization that the two are the same thing.

 

//

 

They first end up with fat, juicy burgers in their hands, and a basket of fries between them, bottles of hard cider sweating onto the black wood beneath their plates. Comfort food at it’s finest.

 

Blake and Yang sit across from each other in a tiny, two-person booth. There’s no extra space. Yang thanks whatever god cares to listen that instead she’s been granted the luxury of proximity. Her foot kicks out every so often, tapping against Blake’s beneath the table. Yang smirks behind her burger when Blake’s head snaps up.

 

The fact that they’ve ended up here, anywhere, together, is a testament of just how probable their combined existence has always been. Even with a history between them, even with several lifetimes of loss and pain and betrayal, Yang still finds herself here. She discovers she’s forgotten the bad and is drawn right back into the good.

 

Blake Belladonna has been the ignition source for so much _good_ in Yang’s life that it’s difficult to remember she has also been the point of combustion for all of the messy bad as well.

 

There’s a whole new level of intoxication when it comes to Blake’s lips. A different degree of drunk of having their fingers wrapped around each other, buried within one another.

 

Falling into bed on Friday was easy, pressing Blake into the mattress, losing her goddamn mind to her fingers, her tongue, her body; that’s the inevitability everyone was always going on about when it came to the two of them. But—Yang realizes as Blake wipes ketchup from her chin, ears quirking in response to Yang’s voice, smile falling with ease on her face at any dumb joke Yang might offer up—sex was a physical experience, but for them, it was grounded in emotions, buried in love. There were a hundred layers that came peeling back with each touch and every kiss.

 

They ripped back like a bandaid, and the truth was gaping wide, exposed to the world and unable to be shut once more. Now was their chance to face the aftermath and Yang could stitch it right back up, shut it out—if she wanted to. But goddamn, Blake had murmured Yang’s name into her ear and there’s the imprint of her fingers still buried on her hip,  purpling bruises still blossoming on her chest, and Yang knew she could never tune her out, could not turn her away. Sex was so much more than physicality between them and Yang craved all the pieces that were falling free in those moments. She wanted to pick each one up, see how it fit against her, how it filled her once more.

 

The food is finished off, their drinks empty, and Yang leads them back to her bike, drives right off to the park that was closed since sunset. They tip the soccer goal like they’d done a dozen times before, climbing up and allowing the netting to wrap around them, sinking beneath them.

 

“Sometimes,” Blake starts, talking as they look up at the cloudy sky, barely any stars visible. “I wake up in the morning and I...forget. I expect you to be next to me still.”

 

“I would,” Yang says in a single second. “If you had let me, Blake. I would’ve been there.”

 

“I know,” Blake says back, no hesitation. “It was my choice to leave.”

 

They both know the truth. Staying wasn’t an option even though it could have been, should have been.

 

“Why?” Yang asks, voice breaking into the night air, shivering around them like freezing muscles in desperation of warmth. “Why did you do that to me?” The weakness has always been there, the defenselessness poorly hidden away. There was never a chance of fooling Blake. They could read each other with clarity and precision, fine print and all.

 

Blake’s fingers bump against Yang’s in the darkness. They both relent, fingers intertwining in synchronicity, acceptance and beseechment in the same grasp, tucked into knuckles, pressed between the folds of skin. “I’m sorry,” Blake says to the night sky, to the stars that refuse to shine down on them, to the universe itself.

 

“That’s not an answer.”

 

A breeze blows. The clouds shift overhead. The darkness remains.

 

“I know.”

 

“Why?” Yang demands, head turning to the side, taking in the silhouette of a person beside her.

 

Blake’s eyes remain fixed on the night above them. She draws in a deep breath, chest expanding, lungs filling. “I don’t know.”

 

“Why.” It’s not a question. It’s an insistence, a command. “You know.”

 

Blake’s eyes fall shut, her teeth dig into her lip, her breath stutters on the way out. “I broke you.”

 

“Yes.”

 

“I didn’t deserve you.”

 

“You don’t get to decide that.”

 

“I did.”

 

“Why?”

 

\--

 

_21_

 

Ruby has taken to typing up all of Yang’s papers for her while Yang sits on her bed, dictating what she wanted on the page.

 

Writing a paper verbally is a hell of a lot more difficult than Yang first expected, finding it harder than usual to find her words. The phrasings escape her by rushing past in a frenzy before she can grab hold of them.

 

“How about this,” Ruby suggests, fingers flying on the page as she’ll start an introductory sentence, open it and let Yang try and find the conclusion until they reach the jargon Ruby doesn’t grasp.

 

All of Yang’s professors had offered to allow her to pass in handwritten work if typing with one hand was too difficult. She thanked them kindly, not explaining that she is not left-handed. They were lucky she managed to take a single note in class as is. “How much do we have?” Yang asks after an hour of attempting to create coherent sentences for a scientific research paper.

 

“A page and a half,” Ruby answers, smiling cheerfully through Yang’s groan. “It could be worse!”

 

Blessedly, Yang’s scroll starts going off, offering a reprieve. The number is unfamiliar. She’s been waiting six weeks for a call. She doesn’t hesitate to answer.

 

“Hello?” she says, wiggling her way off of Ruby’s bed and wandering into her own room, shutting the door, just in case.

 

“Um, hi,” some guy says on the other end. He doesn’t sound familiar.

 

He doesn’t offer anything more, and Yang decides he’s the worst telemarketer she’s ever talked to. “Can I help you?”

 

“Is this...is this Yang?” he asks, voice hushed, uncertain. “Like, Blake’s Yang?”

 

Her name is all it takes for the dull pain to come back to life, searing and scathing as it’s been since the very first day.

 

Clearing her throat, Yang sits on the edge of her bed; feet firmly planted on the floor. “Depends.”

 

“What?”

 

“Nothing,” she dismisses her previous statement before she can bother to build on it. _I don’t know if I still belong to her,_ she wants to answer. _I don’t know if I have the right to call myself hers. I don’t know if I can ever be anything but._ “Why are you calling? Is Blake okay?”

 

“Not really.”

 

Shit, the air from her lungs is gone, stolen in a word. “What’s wrong with her?” The panic mounts in an instant. Had she not left at all? Has she been somewhere else this whole time? Unable to reach Yang? Unable to pick up a call or be at her side? “Where is she?”

 

“Uh, well, this is her friend Sun?” He says his own name as a question.

 

“Her friend Sun in Vacuo?” Yang asks, words careful, hope fluttering like a butterfly’s wings somewhere beneath the fear and the confusion that weigh on her like a resting elephant.

 

He clears his throat. “Yeah, that’s me. And that’s where she is. Vacuo.”

 

Vacuo was a minimum of a six-hour airship ride out of Vale. There was no way to end up in Vacuo by mistake, no stopping in for a cup of coffee. She was on a different goddamn continent, and she couldn’t even bother to tell them. “Oh.”

 

“And she would kill me for calling you.”

 

“Then why are you?” Yang cuts him off harshly. What was the point of calling her if Blake didn’t want anyone to find her? Why would a call change that? “She can make her own decisions.”

 

“She makes bad ones sometimes,” Sun answers. “She needs people to help her. You know, like all of us.”

 

Yang stands from where she’d perched herself on the edge of their bed, _her_ bed, and takes measured steps back and forth the space between the bed and the door. “She doesn’t want my help, Sun. That’s why she’s with you.”

 

“But-”

 

“Blake knows I would do anything for her. She knows.” If nothing had proven it before, the right arm that laid on the floor by her feet several weeks ago was sure enough to get the message across. “She can make her own decisions.”

 

“They’re self-destructive!” Sun says in a rush, his voice rising. “She looks worse than when I met her in the White Fang.”

 

“That’s on Blake.” She doesn’t mean to be so callous, but she refuses to force herself onto Blake. She will deny the portion of herself that wants to lie at Blake’s feet and beg her to come back, to love her again, to look past what has happened and stand by her side. “I didn’t push her away, Sun.”

 

“I know.”

 

“I didn’t get a single word in one way or the other.”

 

“I know.”

 

“So why the fuck are you calling me?”

 

“Because you love her. I thought...I thought you would want to help her.”

 

Yang scoffs. He has no idea what he’s talking about, no concept of who he is talking to. “She has to want the help. Besides, I don’t have anything else to offer right about now.”

 

Through the line, she can almost feel his questions, can sense his hesitation. “I know something bad happened but...I don’t know what to do, like at all.”

 

There are so many different things Yang herself needs right about now. So much she would offer out to Blake but that she is suffering without. She’s crippled by the loss of everything at once, unable to pick herself up properly, incapable of being what anyone needs, including herself. There are so many different ways someone could help her. “Just...don’t leave her,” Yang answers, eyes slipping shut, the emptiness of this room never more apparent, devoid of life besides what little she brought to it. “If she lets you be at her side, then be there. If she only lets you in at a distance, maintain it.”

 

A pair of Blake’s boots are still propped against the edge of the closet. Her book opened on her nightstand, page saved where she had left off. Her backpack is on the floor, half open with the textbooks still tucked inside. They were rentals. Yang would need to return them.

 

“Yang-”

 

“No.” He didn’t get to speak too much. He could talk about Blake, say her name, paint a picture of her pain. Yang is too weak to process that. She will fall to the floor and when she got back up would be on her way to Vacuo, seeking out someone who was running away from her. “I’m not apart of this. Blake has removed me. Please respect that.”

 

“She loves you.”

 

“She left me,” Yang corrects. “Please, Sun. Respect that for both of us.”

 

She ends the call and tries not to think about how she’s severing the first connection she’s had to Blake since her right arm had been cleaved from her body. The ground doesn’t seem like it should still be beneath her. Somehow the world has not cracked apart, the water is still held within the ocean, gravity has not slipped away.

 

That week she sleeps in Ruby’s bed, lives out of Ruby’s drawers, goes into their room, her room, for only the essentials. There was too much missing. And even more remaining.

 

\--

 

_24_

 

It doesn’t become cold; the cold was already present. It simply becomes unbearable.

 

The businesses around them shut down for the night, only diners, bars, and a corner front CVS remaining open. Weiss and Ruby will be at the apartment. Sun and Neptune will be at home.

 

Yang takes the way back slowly, winding in and out of side streets, along neighborhoods, around parking lots.

 

Blake clings to her from behind, arms wrapped tight, face pressed against Yang’s back to hide away from the wind.

 

They’ve been broken for years, reformed in fragments that were the best hope they had of remaining upright, fighting against every breeze, every slight disruption that threatened to topple them over.

 

The _why_ follows them through the streets, dangles off the end of the motorcycle, clanking against the pavement. There’s no hiding from a question that demands to be answered. There’s no running when it follows you just as fast, just as close as when it first entered the atmosphere and was first breathed to life.

 

Yang wants to pretend like she knows the answer, wants to assume what everyone has been telling her. Blake just wants to protect you. Blake just couldn’t stand that she was the one to hurt you. It seems right, feels right, but it doesn’t quite fit. Because yes, Blake might be the reason that Yang has lived the last two years without her right arm. That was nothing compared to walking around without your heart, though. It paled in comparison of living without warmth, without the only lifesource that has kept you going this long.

 

“I’ll see you in the morning,” Yang says when she eventually pulls up outside of Sun’s apartment, watches Blake inside, doesn’t say anything else, doesn’t dare ask anything else.

 

The why follows her home, tucks itself into bed beside her, holds her close in her dreams, drenches itself in the shower beside her. The why has never left, has never been forgotten, never left behind. She has lived with this question for two years. Now she wonders if there might not be an answer worth hearing. If the only reason is what everyone has always said. If the only driving force had truly been that pitifully misguided.

 

Maybe she doesn’t want to know after all.

 

//

 

For the last two weeks, the lumpy, polyester couch has been more than enough for Blake to fall asleep. It took all of two minutes lying there before her eyes would slip shut, her mind shutting down, her body giving in. She was exhausted, physically and mentally, and the couch was enough.

 

After tonight, after soccer goals and empty skies and questions with emptier answers, it’s no longer enough.

 

Yang asked why, and Blake has an answer; she has a whole arsenal of reasons, rationalizations. When her mom had come out to visit her, she’d asked the same question with a tender hand against Blake’s cheek, a broken expression on her face.

 

_“Why would you leave her, Blake? You know she doesn’t hold anything that happened against you? You_ know _she just wants you to come back.”_

 

And she did, she does. The question was sufficient to make her crack open then and there. Messy, fractured sobs ready to break free, the sadness welling and the misery mounting.

 

But Blake swallowed against it, pushed it back down, made herself forget what she’s sacrificed.

 

“ _This happened because of me,”_ Blake had said, head shaking, eyes blinking. “She doesn’t deserve what I’ve caused,” she echoes now.

 

It’s more than that, though. Yang knows it. Blake feels it sitting on her chest, weighing her down. There’s selfishness intertwined, fear driving her forward, away.

 

The light of the smoke alarm blinks in the corner of the kitchen, the green illuminated numbers on the microwave flashing back at her, taunting at how little sleep she’ll get tonight, before tomorrow announces itself, before the culmination of eleven years finally work towards it’s ending.

 

There’s a demon that has stalked her for years, buried itself in her heart, in her mind, and she’s been running. Now is finally the time to slice him out—cut herself free. The freedom scares her too. The healing hurts, the closing of the chapter shakes her to her core. Freedom from the monster means no more excuses, no more rationalizations, no more hiding. Tomorrow was the beginning of the end, the chance to stand up for the pieces of her life he’s tainted and destroyed.

 

Tomorrow is the chance to remind him of what he hasn’t managed to take away, of who she has still managed to become. And maybe, it’s a chance to reach for a little bit more.

 

\--

 

_18_

 

Yang erupts from the front door of the science building with a cheer, throwing her hands up in the air. “We are _done_ , Belladonna,” she says with a lightness to her tone, throwing her arms casually around Blake’s neck. There’s more to it now, a new weight to every touch that didn’t exist before duck ponds and meteor showers and the knowledge that the whole sky on display does not compare to the flash of gold light and brilliance in front of her.

 

“We have two days before we have to pack up all our shit and go home,” Yang continues with her arm still around Blake, Nora and Ren running after the two of them. “Tonight, we’re going out.”

 

“Where to?” Blake asks with a quirk of her eyebrow and a smile playing on the edge of her lips. Yang at a party was a whole other sight to behold. She was frantic energy uncontained, seeking out a source to direct into. Blake stayed nearby.

 

“Ooh, I know a place!” Nora shouts, finger in the air. “And since I most definitely failed that class as I knew from the very beginning of Ren deciding we should take it together,” she fixes him with a hard glare, “we shall go there.”

 

“Works for me,” Yang said without anyone ever specifying where this “here” is.

 

Blake shrugs, willing to go if everyone else was. Weiss would be the one they’d have to work on. “Sure, why not.”

 

“Great!” Nora remains equally enthusiastic if she passes or fails a test. There was rarely a not-enthused Nora. “Wear your best clubbing outfits and bring cash to chip in for an Uber.” Her and Ren are off without another word.

 

“Club, huh?” Blake asks, not unattuned to the fact that Yang’s arm still hangs around her shoulder. Things happened in clubs. They were dark; there was music...alcohol. “Sounds like fun.”

 

“Anything’s fun with you, baby,” Yang teases. Blake thinks of 3 AM dew and potential.

 

//

 

Picking what to wear is surprisingly easy. There was a black mini skirt tucked into one of her drawers that paired perfectly with a pair of low-cut, high heeled boots. Blake pulls out a white and purple halter top that sits high enough on her waist that skin is exposed, an offering to be touched.

 

Yang instructs for Blake to “pick her up” twenty minutes to seven. Blake knocks on the door instead of texting to give Yang the satisfaction of the whole set up. “My ride’s here!” she calls to Weiss, opening the door and greeting Blake with a smile that falters when her eyebrows shoot up and her jaw drops. “Damn. You aren’t fucking around.”

 

Yang can only say so much with the loose white crop-top that’s already slipping of one shoulder. Maybe Yang is making an offering of her own.

 

“Not really my style,” Blake answers, letting confidence run away with her, allowing a hint of flirtation to slip in. Well, more than usual.

 

“Yang, your ride is my ride. We are all taking the same ride.” Weiss already sounds exacerbated as she throws their dorm door back open. “Do you even have your wallet?”

 

“A year later and this is as far as we’ve gotten,” Yang says with a thumb tossed in Weiss’ direction. “Don’t worry, darling; we’ll get a little marijuana in you and mellow you right the fuck out.”

 

Weiss “hmphs” on her way past them but doesn’t protest the concept.

 

The start of summer has already descended, and the air remains warm. The sun is hanging low in the sky, casting the expanse above them in warm oranges and dusty pinks. Yang intertwines her and Blake’s hands, tugs her forward, doesn’t drop it until they’re all in the car, squished in the back with Jaune and Pyrrha who are amidst awkward conversation that makes Blake cringe just from listening to it.

 

The club is outside of the direct “university town” they typically were sequestered too, and they all offer their humble portions of the Uber ride, piling out with a thanks. Nora sprints right up to the bouncer who, of course, she knows and waves them all in.

 

The music is loud, the room just a little too warm, only a few too many people—making it just right. Yang beelines right for the bar, passes Blake a drink without ever asking what she wanted. Blake sips, watching Ren and Nora dance, Weiss and Pyrrha finding their own way to the edges of the dancefloor, moving beside each other before eventually drifting into each other.

 

“Think you can get away with dressing like _that_ and just standing here?” Yang asks, more a shout than a whisper, against Blake’s ear. She throws back the rest of her drink and holds out a hand, beckoning Blake forward, towards her. There’s no denying someone like Yang. There’s no way to shut out the a brightness so vibrant it was almost burning.

 

Blake tosses her head back to down the rest of her beverage, exposing her neck, giving Yang no other chance but to watch her. When she looks back up Yang’s eyes are clouded, violet shifting to red—halfway there.

 

They’ve danced together before. It’s a staple at college parties—drink, smoke, dance, repeat. Sure, they danced with other people, but they preferred it like this. Blake never danced with someone else long before Yang cut in, hands moving along the curves of Blake’s body, sliding against her. Blake was no better. Just two minutes of watching Yang with someone beside herself was sufficient to cloud Blake’s judgment, disrupt her rational thoughts about what friends were and were not allowed to do and think and feel towards each other.

 

Tonight there wasn’t any space for those games.

 

Blake takes Yang’s hand and pulls her towards the dance floor, right in the middle where it is most crowded, where they’ll have no choice but to be close, pressed together. There’s an excuse, but neither of them buy it.

 

Yang moves like the beat was born within her, apart of her. Her hips slide against Blake’s, her shoulders rhythmic and smooth. The beat drops and Yang lets her body slide down Blake, holding eye contact the whole way down, the entire way back up. Their lips pass right by each other, Yang’s breath washing over Blake’s neck, across her lips. It’s warm, smells like whiskey, sends fire through Blake’s veins.

 

There’s exposed skin, and that’s where their hands gravitate, not moving anywhere enough to go beyond dancing, but fingers brushing along hips, skating over an exposed shoulder, lingering on the back of a neck. Blake’s only had one drink, but her whole head is foggy, filled with Yang, lost on how it feels to have the pads of her fingers pressed against bare skin, in remembering how Yang’s hands buried into Blake’s hair, how her lips fit just perfectly between.

 

Kissing isn’t quite something they can pass off as friends, not that they didn’t try.

 

They had stumbled home after the night of the meteor shower, unfolded blanket tossed over Yang’s shoulder, empty beer bottles clinking together in Blake’s hand. It was one, singular kiss that had carried on, each of them pressing for more, refusing to let that be _it_. The wanting was evenly spread between them. Blake surrendered, Yang followed a second later, submitting herself entirely. There’s a moment outside their dorm where Blake wants to say something, wants to let the glass shatter against the cement beneath their feet as she grabbed each side of Yang’s face and held her in another kiss, another embrace. There was more waiting to be realized.

 

Instead, Blake bit her lip, tried to find words, had none to offer. “Thanks for…”

 

“Yeah,” Yang answers when Blake drifts off. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

 

And that was that. Five and a half weeks later and it was still just...that.

 

Except now there’s heavy music around them, the air thick with alcohol and weed and bodies moving together, wanting each other. It was as intoxicating as the alcohol, as drugs, as the way Yang bites her lip, taps her fingers along Blake’s waist, laughs at her jokes. Blake is gone. She’s lost in purple-tinged red and the way Yang fits against her like she was built to hold her.

 

There’s an intention between every sway of Blake’s hips, every slide of her shoulders, the way she holds Yang’s eyes in fixation. Invitations were out there, offerings extended—Blake was ready to take what was proposed in the swaying of bodies, what was suggested with a hand running down her chest, along her ribs.

 

She grabs one of Yang’s hands into hers, laces their fingers together, takes the other and lets it knot in the back of Yang’s head, knitting into her hair and drawing her towards her. Yang was taller, even when Blake wore her tallest heels. She was always taller. She leans down now, finds Blake’s lips with hers, captures Blake’s lower lip between her own and sucks on it gently. They could be thirteen years old on her bedroom floor once more, doing it “just for practice.” That’s how slow Yang draws them together, how tenuous her movements are.

 

Blake pushes up on her tiptoes, pulls her hand free from Yang’s to wrap it around her back, hold her closer. She sighs into Yang’s mouth, relief and contentment, and _finally, finally, it gets to be how it should_ wrapping her up all at once.

 

When they pull apart, Yang has eyes the color of desire, wanting spelled within them as she looks down at Blake, smile spreading. “Trying to tell me something, Belladonna?”

 

Blake swallows, finds her courage, forgets the potential for loss with a heady rush of knowledge of just how much she has to gain. “Yes.”

 

It’s not quite the flirtatious remark she’d intended but it’s loud in here, and her head is enveloped in a cloud of yellow sunlight. Yes would have to do.

 

Yang smiles at her fondly, her eyes light. “And what would that be?”

 

Words were Blake’s thing. She defaulted to words, in school, in work, in life, she could wrap herself in answers as long as words were in her arsenal.

 

Words, as of this moment, did not hold a flame to the potential of physicality.

 

Blake sacrifices words, throws them across the room, out into the cold and dark in favor of placing her hands on the side of Yang’s face and pulling her towards her in a rush of sobriety. “That,” she says when they pull apart, allowing her hands to trail down Yang’s body, eager to touch her properly, shocked that she was willing to admit this in a club at ten on a Thursday night with only one drink streaming through her blood.

 

“Fuck,” Yang mutters the second Blake steps back.

 

“Precisely.”

 

Yang laughs loud and clear in response, leans in, nudges Blake’s face to the side and kisses her again. “I’m gonna go get you another drink.” Before she can move to step away, Blake grabs her hand, drags Yang back towards her. She wasn’t interested in drinks. She moves to the music, not breaking a stare with Yang as she does so. She wasn’t interested in dancing either, but it was closer—it would do.

 

Either the look or the move of her body is enough to convince Yang that drinks were not the priority. She gives in, hands falling to Blake again as the lights flash around them, the build of the beat, climb of the tension as it trails upward before an inevitable drop, a freefall to more, to hopes realized, desire met.

 

Yang’s flustered, a look that Blake isn’t used to seeing on her, one that Yang attempts to cover up, never one to easily relinquish her suave demeanor, her relaxed mannerisms. Blake knows her better than that. She picks up on it in the stumble of Yang’s hands, in the way the music still lives in her but courses through differently.

 

It’d be easy to lose her nerve right about now, getting wrapped up in Yang’s unease, her uncertainty. But Blake pushes through, holding onto the sensuality of the moment, letting the music drift her closer, pull her further in.

 

Blake wraps her arms around Yang’s neck, pulls herself in so she’s at the perfect spot to kiss her there, lips pressing against bare, smooth skin, trailing up and down Yang’s neck, beneath her ear. She’s never wanted to touch someone to the extent that she needs to feel all of Yang right now. Never has Blake ever craved to be touched by someone before, has she felt so safe forging on.

 

“Should we…” Blake lets the words peter off, leaves the invitation to get away—go somewhere just the two of them—unsaid but living, breathing between them.

 

“ _Yes_ ,” Yang answers without a moment’s hesitation, sentence finished or not. “Jesus Christ, yes.”

 

Well, that lasted all of an hour. They duck out with a wave in Weiss’ direction, no other explanation offered. The air outside is open, cool. There’s a different sort of heaviness between them now, the atmosphere willing to let it drift up, up, and away with no further questions, no more answers expected of where this is going, what they will become.

 

Blake holds it tight, fights against the ease of release.

 

“Guess I could’ve driven,” Yang chuckles, pulling out her scroll to get them a ride back.

 

Right, either of them could have driven because they are both painfully sober. Blake has regret at the fact that she stopped Yang from getting that other drink she’d offered.  

 

An Uber pulls up a minute later, drives back towards the university without question, rap music playing quietly from the front, drifting towards the back where it sat between them.

 

There’s no discussion when they get dropped off, no awkward hesitation. They both know Yang’s dorm is empty; Blake’s is questionable.

 

Yang marches them right to her dorm room, turns the key in the lock. The keys hit the ground with a rattle and clack as soon as the door pushes open; Yang doesn’t bother to pick them up, twisting Blake’s back against the closed bedroom door, a thigh sliding between her, hands on Blake’s sides, sliding up her shirt.

 

It’s instinctual, pressing back against Yang, feeling her there between Blake’s legs, her fingers teasing and light on her torso before they grow heavier, more urgent. Blake lifts her arms above her head, an invitation that left no questions in place. Yang peels her shirt off, drops her lips to Blake’s collar bone, the soft skin just beneath, drops to her knees and presses kisses all along Blake’s stomach. There’s a brushing of lips against where her scars still live, the worst of the white, puckered markings of skin, reforged but never the same.

 

Blake buries her hands into Yang’s hair. She’s always been enraptured with it, how it spills over Yang’s shoulders, down her back. It was bright as sunlight, a beacon. Burying her hands in it now Blake could cry, the swelling of seeing Yang on her knees in front of her, the knowledge that this was happening, that she was wanted. It was enough to throw her over the edge with a single touch, a simple ghost of desire over where she was craving Yang most of all.

 

But no, this was to be savored. This was too many years coming to lose it all pressed against a door still more than half dressed. “Stand up,” Blake says in a pant, gives Yang’s hair the gentlest of tugs, pulling her towards her with a cautious roughness. “Bed.”

 

Without seeing her, Blake can imagine Yang’s raised eyebrow, the quirk of her lips as she says, “Awfully demanding right about now, baby,” Yang murmurs but complies, stepping back in the dark, Blake’s hand clasped in hers. “I see how it is. Kiss me once, and you think you’ve got any sort of control over me. Think you can just-” Yang’s silenced with a sharp inhale as Blake drags Yang’s skirt down her hips, takes a singular second to run her fingers along her underwear, the warmth and wet undeniable.

 

“You were saying?” Blake teases, momentarily unable to experience a single thing other than how much she is _wanted_ . Oh, it was a whole new feeling. This was dizzying, intoxicating, consuming. _This,_ Blake realizes as Yang spins her around presses her against the mattress, grinds her body on top of hers, releases the clasp of Blake’s bra, _this is love._

 

Blake makes Yang strip her bare before she’s allowed to touch her again, afraid otherwise she would come undone too soon, fall apart too quickly. She wanted to be completely cracked open, entirely vulnerable. Yang complies, pulling back each layer with kisses along newly exposed skin, tasting all parts of Blake against her tongue, supple skin gently grasped between her teeth.

 

When she pulls down Blake’s underwear Blake’s head is already in a cloud, already lost in where Yang has been, where she still has to go, how it will feel to finally be filled by her, how maybe this has always been where they would end up, the only road to go down. Yang pauses, kisses the sensitive skin of Blake’s inner thigh, coming to a halt before looking up at Blake. Their eyes meet and there’s a question sitting between them, a hint of uncertainty as Yang swallows, fingers still lingering on the edge. “You’re so beautiful.” The words are said like a confession, like a truth so omnipresent it had to be breathed to life or it would swallow them whole.

 

Damn, now wasn’t the time to cry. “Yang,” Blake says simply. It was the best she had, the most she could offer.

 

Somehow, it’s enough. Yang places her lips against Blake’s thigh once more before she reaches back up, pulls her into a kiss. Blake’s eyes fall shut as she disappears into it—and then Yang’s fingers slip inside of her, teasing at first, cautious, but then she submits, figures out the exact movement that causes Blake to moan against her. A moment is all it would take, but Yang slips her fingers out, traces her lips back down Blake’s body, there’s an urgency this time unlike before, a slight rush even as she attempts to draw the moment out. Her still wet fingers press against Blake’s clit before being joined by Yang’s tongue.

 

There’s a thought of how this moment could last for an eternity, and it still wouldn’t be enough before Blake trembles. The sensation runs in waves through her body, building until they reach an edge, tumble to a precipice, set free with a moan as Yang’s tongue circles, encourages her all the way over. Yang’s body falls on top of hers, lazy kisses being placed all along Blake’s chest, up her neck, anywhere Yang can reach as she makes her way back up Blake’s body, head resting against her chest. “Well, that was one way to tell me,” Yang says, breath gasping as she laughs.

 

Blake laughs with her, body melted into the sheets, content and completed. There had been years of lost moments, at least an entire two semesters where they could have been doing _this,_ and they had missed out. It was a damn shame. “Seemed most effective.”

 

Now she slides her hands along Yang’s back, releases her bra. Blake bites her lip to withhold any more moans as a whole new flare of need fires within her. “Yang, I-”

 

“Put your hands on me, Blake,” Yang sighs, grinding herself along Blake’s thigh, searching for more. “Let’s stick with this most effective concept a little longer.”

 

They do, a couple more times, barely remembering to pull clothes back on before passing out, hoping Weiss didn’t entirely lose her mind for them bailing on her when she came home later.

 

Offerings, invitations, they would claim it all, take as much as the other was willing to give. Blake falls asleep with her head nestled against Yang’s chest, a new sort of peace enveloping them. This is what complete must feel like. It only makes sense to refuse to go back to a before.

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As a disclaimer, I don't really write smut but like, these two demand it. Next chapter is shorter which is why this one is so freaking long. Maybe this time I will actually manage to update sooner? So far that hasn't been panning out. Thank you, again, to everyone for all of your incredible feedback. I really appreciate it. I hope as we start aiming towards a little resolution of the angst that you still enjoy!


	10. Chapter 10

_24_

 

Tuesday morning Blake walks into the courthouse alone. Sun offers to drive her every morning, willingly attending each session of this trial out of support. He situated himself just behind her parents with Neptune often at his side, chatting amicably with Ilia. Sun was a good friend.

 

The sky is bright, clouds cleared from the night before, a brilliant blue overhead. The wind is consistent, and Blake holds her hair down, wraps her jacket tighter, her heels clicking up the concrete steps.

 

Yang’s waiting just inside, standing by the front door with a loose, relaxed posture that doesn’t phase Blake for a single second. There was none of that same anxiety hidden tight in the ridges of Yang’s spine, laced into her bones, tied into her chest. “Hey,” she says as soon as Blake walks in, the sunlight bright in her eyes, filtering its way around Yang as the door opens before slipping shut again, the outside cold and brushes of breeze left behind.

 

It’s obvious Yang was waiting for her, passing a cup of tea that warms Blake’s skin on contact, the soft way her eyes regard Blake, capture her from the second she’s walked through the door. Now isn’t the time, but if Yang so much as placed a hand on her, Blake would drag her somewhere else—down the hall, up the street, across town. Away.

 

“Morning,” Blake says, sipping, feeling the warmth ignite on the way down, spreading to her stomach, to her toes. “How’d you sleep?”

 

Yang snorts, casts Blake a look. “How about you?”

 

“Same.”

 

They hold each other in a smile, caught between familiarity, habitual tendencies, and the knowledge that this is new again; this is another dimension, a different life.

 

Yang’s metal arm reaches forward and for a flash of a second Blake think she’s reaching for her. But then it drops, the opportunity vanishes. “Let’s get this over with.”

 

Restraint is a muscle, built stronger by unrelenting stamina and never ceasing resistance. It’s a muscle that’s become fatigued. It should be stronger than ever except the acid is building up, the soreness setting in. Blake reaches out instead, grabs Yang’s hand, cool metal pressed between her fingers. “Yeah.”

 

\--

 

_17_

 

Throwing her bike on the grass, Blake races up to the front door, trying the knob and finding it locked. Looking down at her scroll, she checks to see if Yang had texted or called her. They didn’t technically make official plans, but they never did. Announcements were only made when one of them wouldn’t be over.

 

“Blake!” she hears and pokes her head around the porch, finding Yang standing at the back the house, green paint smeared on her arm. “Back here!”

 

With a smile, she sets into a jog towards the backyard. She’d only been back in Patch for a couple of months, but they had fallen into such an easy routine. Sometimes she could forget for a minute that she had left at all. Forget all the ways they’ve changed.

 

The backyard is the same cluttered mess it’s always been. A tarp was thrown over the lawnmower, the shed half shut with a bike tire poking out, the swinging chair that Yang and Blake had spent many summer afternoons napping on sat beneath the oak tree. It wouldn’t take much for someone to convince her that she’s thirteen again, that all the nightmares with the White Fang and Adam and mistakes were nothing more, a bad dream. It was a weak desire, but one Blake can’t deny herself.

 

Yang’s standing over a thick, white poster board, hand on her hip and spray paint can in hand as she stares contemplatively down. “You know, I normally lean towards yellow, but I think orange would show up a whole lot better. What do you think?”

 

Blake comes to stand beside her, staring down at white canvas with what looks like an old yardstick stapled to it. “What are you doing?”

 

Yang rolls her eyes. “It’s Faunus pride march tomorrow,” she answers. “We don’t wanna be the losers without signs.”

 

Taking a step back, Blake blinks at her, the happiness somehow getting lost along the way, translating into fat, broken tears as her lower lip quivers.

 

“Whoa, shit,” Yang drops her spray paint can, turning to Blake in her bare feet, hands coming to rest on either side of Blake’s face. “Did I do something wrong? Are signs like a super outdated idea? Is there some history of tragic Faunus versus sign incident I’m not aware of?”

 

Yang bites down on her lip, glancing from the sign on the ground and back to Blake with nervous eyes. “No, stupid,” Blake says with a thick voice, her head falling forward, crashing against Yang’s shoulder and finding the perfect place to rest. “You’re too good,” she cries. Too good for me, for humanity, for this world. Yang Xiao Long was so often the epitome of good, and no one ever appreciated it.

 

Yang’s arms wrap tightly around Blake, hands stroking her back, her hair, a kiss pressed into her temple. “Please,” she answers, so quietly Blake can’t even be sure she hears the word correctly. “I’m only half of what you deserve.”

 

\--

 

_24_

 

Adam takes the stand again, and it’s worse than before. It’s more crippling than the first time. Now that she’s already been dragged back in and sucked back under. The whole nightmare has been forced out into the light, has been acknowledged as actuality. Blake is suffocating on truth, choking on a collection of memories that play on repeat from the second he takes the stand.

 

This time there is no subtlety of a brush. Blake reaches for Yang’s hand, covering more than half the space and asking for the comfort she has to offer, the peace she needs.

 

Ironwood follows up Ilia’s statements from the day before, demanding answers to the claims that were made, remaining steadfast, authoritarian. Ironwood plays the game well.

 

“There’s a lot of claims against you, Mr. Taurus,” Ironwood says, fingertips against his chin, eyebrows drawn in. “Far beyond just what my clients are charging you for.”

 

“A crowd will rally behind any cause,” Adam answers simply. He flashes a look in Blake’s direction, and she reads the words there. _They rallied behind someone as small and weak as you, didn’t they?_ “It doesn’t make them right.”

 

“You mean a cause like yours?” Ironwood responds with ease.

 

“Objection,” the defendant says. “Irrelevant information.”

 

The judge deliberates. “Sustained.”

 

“Mr. Taurus, I think myself and the jury share a very legitimate question.” Adam waits expectantly. The members of the jury exchange a look. Yang’s hand squeezes within Blake’s. “What did you hope to gain that night?”

 

“As I’ve explained previously,” Adam says. “I had spent many years with Blake. We were extremely close, and I was worried for her safety.”

 

“The sort of worried that causes you to draw a sword and hold it out in her direction?”

 

He chuckles. It’s not an evil laugh, more condescending. “It was a stressful situation and, with all due respect to your clients,” he shoots a look to them both as if to suggest no respect was due at all, “it seems obvious to me that the scenario was misinterpreted. Yang began attacking me, fists, nails, feet. She didn’t hold anything back.”

 

Yang tenses beside Blake, her body going rigid, her hand trembling in Blake’s grasp. Of course there was nothing held back. At that moment, there was seemingly one way to protect Blake. Yang was going to give it her all.

 

“Well, you had a blade drawn on her. One of which you promptly used to slice through the majority of her right arm, severing blood flow and causing for a complete amputation to be required.” Ironwood says with a straight face, a presentation of facts. “Seems to me like the use of fingernails would be appropriate.”

 

“It was self-defense,” Adam argues, making himself smaller, playing up his vulnerability, how the world has turned on him and how he has suffered. Blake would be more than okay with making him suffer a little more; at this point, he has earned a lifetime of suffering, maybe a couple. “I’m not proud of the damage I caused, but it was instinctual, basic self-preservation, sir.”

 

Blake rolls her eyes, hand clenching tight in Yang’s. “Bullshit,” she mumbles under her breath, withering under the stare Adam sends in her direction. “Can I just kill him and get this over with?” she whispers to Yang who turns to her with wide eyes before pressing her lips together and stifling a smile.

 

“Only if I get to hold him down.”

 

Safety has been fleeting, temporary, a thing Blake has had to claim over and over, never quite believing. Safety has never reached a cemented, steadfast reality.

 

There’s a second between questions, a moment where Adam’s eyes settle on Blake situated beside Yang, their arms reaching towards the other. He glares, eyes hard, teeth clenching. Blake knows that look; it makes her wither, heart trembling out of rhythm, begging her to run. Safe is a false concept, an unclaimed expectation.

 

The questioning ends, the words spoken having gone unheard, no comprehension.

 

Yang squeezes her hand and Blake registers they’ve said her name, called her back to the stands.

 

Right, time to do this again. She stands, walks behind Yang’s seat, fingers skimming along her back, her shoulders.

 

“Hey,” Yang whispers just as she goes by, ready to make her way to the stands. It was with Ironwood—friendly questioning—someone on her side. She could do this. “I’m here.” It’s an offering, a sacrifice all its own.

 

Blake takes it gladly. She fights back the rising tide of emotions, panic and sadness and this deep ache of remembrance that pushes her forward and sees her right to the stand, guides her to sit, looking out at the crowd.

 

Endings don’t seem feasible. Blake challenges this fact. She looks Adam in the eye, raised above him, over him. There’s no power that she can dredge up out of herself, no determination that she is finding deep within. She’s tired and weak and hurt. The suffering she’s endured has been because of herself, yes, but it started with him. It took its first steps in his presence, broke into a gallop through his encouragements.

 

She looks back at him with her chest rising and falling with each breath, her heart pounding against her ribs, the world around them growing narrow, dark. When she does look away, it isn’t out of fear, not out of self-preservation.

 

Ironwood says her name, and she turns in her seat, fixes her eyes ahead, and she relays a lifetime of abuse, a history of a tragic story unfolding piece by piece with each question she’s presented with. She says every word to Yang, who watches her with patience, sympathy, and understanding. She tells Yang who knows the truth, who understands the words and their weight and what it all means before Blake has managed to choke it out.

 

Yang does not look away. She does not hide from the pain. She takes it head-on, absorbs it as her own, offers out a gentle smile, an even stare.

 

_I’m here,_ Yang says, and it rings out with clarity, settles not in Blake’s ears but right in her chest, beside her heart.

 

_Me too,_ she wants to shout back, wants to declare. _I am here. You are with me. And maybe, just maybe, we are safe._

 

\--

 

_13_

 

“W-what do you mean?” Yang asks. It’s two days before Halloween, and she’s sitting on her bed, legs crossed beneath her, scroll pressed against her cheek.

 

“I mean that I have more important things going on, Yang,” Blake says without hesitation or a single hint of regret. “I’m making a difference here. I can change the world if I put my time into this cause, do you get that? Adam says-”

 

“Adam?” Yang cuts her off immediately. “Isn’t he like, six years older than us?”

 

There’s static silence on the other end. “So?”

 

Yang throws around some phrasings in her head, debating word choices, what was worth saying, and what was best held back. There was a lot she kept her reins tight on recently. Just enough, tight control on the words coming out of her mouth, thinking of how Blake might perceive them. She wants to prevent Blake from getting mad at her, to ensure her best friend would still text her during the day, would call her in the evening.

 

Except it had already turned into a text or two during the day, slow and empty replies. A call once a week, normally short, stilted conversation. Like she couldn’t even talk freely, like someone was telling her what to say, never how she spoke to Yang before.

 

“Don’t you think it’s a little weird that a guy six years older than you is spending so much time around you?”

 

“He sees potential in me, Yang! He believes in our cause more than anyone else here, and he sees that I do too. He knows I’m mature and that I can handle it.”

 

“We’re thirteen, Blake.” Yang sighs, shoulders dropping, eyes staring down at her comforter, heart racing and then coming to a crawl. Her fight or flight reared up and came crashing down all in the same minute, like her body knew she wasn’t winning this one way or the other. “We’re not the head of any revolution.”

 

“Maybe you aren’t,” Blake spits back, angry.

 

Yang knows how this conversation started. She can feel the end coming for her, a rising tide she can’t get away from fast enough. No matter how much force she pushes against it, the water was coming. It was strong enough to take her out; it was stronger than she could ever be.

 

“Please just talk to me,” the words spill past her lips, tears filling the brim of her eyes, a slow roasting burn resting in her veins, circulating through back to her arteries to flare alive with newly gifted oxygen. “Help me understand.”

 

Blake doesn’t speak. Yang prays she can hear the sadness in her voice, that she recognizes what is happening between them, that she too is desperate to prevent it from taking place.

 

“I can’t do that, Yang,” Blake answers back, her voice devoid of inflection, free of emotion, separate from every anguished squeeze in Yang’s chest. “You can’t understand.”

 

The call drops just like that. Yang sobs on top of the covers of her bed, the fire extinguishing before it ever flames to life, a steady ice pouring through her veins, freezing up the beating of her heart, the shine of life bursting through her cells.

 

No one ever told her it was the end of something.

 

But no one announces the apocalypse ahead of time. The end of the world sneaks up on you, grabs you from behind, and drags you to the darkness beneath.

 

No one ever tells you just how long the darkness can last.

 

\--

 

_14_

 

The scroll feels like a dead weight in Blake’s hand as she passes it over. At some point it had become a habit, an unquestioning reflex to pass the device over as soon as he walked in a room. _I want to make sure you aren’t straying from the path,_ he assured her in the beginning, _I need to help you stay focused so we can succeed._

 

That was why she was here at all. Sacrificing her time was worth it when the potential of difference eclipsed the loss. Adam helped her see the righteousness of their actions, the rationalization of the pain she suffered.

 

“What is this number?” he demands, looking over her call history.

 

Yang had called from her dad’s scroll. She had called with a desperation in her tone, a pleading to her words.

 

Instructing Yang not to call her, not to “bother” her, had been a new kind of devastating. Even if she knew it was the right thing, for both of them, it still stung. A part of Blake believed she was protecting Yang. A bigger portion wondered if she was only protecting herself.

 

Her shoulder rises in a casual shrug. “Wrong number.”

 

His stare analyzes her answer; both eyes narrowing as if they could both see her, both evaluate her for truth. His thumb deletes the number from her history. “Tell them not to call again.”

 

“Already done.” She tells the truth. Lying was dangerous.

 

\--

 

_24_

 

Yang can still hear her pencil scratching across the paper. She can see the erase marks embedded into the page, the truth inscribed for someone else to witness. The truth wasn’t something to run away from. Yang had embraced her new reality, had faced what losing her arm meant—what losing Blake meant—and carved a path forward. She didn’t turn away or run and hide because it was not who she was.

 

The truth was also not something she advertised. It was hardly a broadcast she wanted to make.

 

She’s called to the stands, and she takes slow, deliberate steps up, raises her right hand, swears to speak the truth, live the truth, only the truth. She turns and faces Ironwood. Her expression is settled and her eyes a gentle, rational lavender. With a singular nod, she tells him she’s ready, the truth was hers to face and now—hers to share. That, if nothing else, it was worth dredging up. For justice and vengeance, sure. There was no secret as to why they were here today, though.

 

“Ms. Xiao Long, please tell myself and the jury _why_ you made the first physical move that night.”

 

Yang swallows, her left hand shakes, her right reaching out to still it. “I was scared.”

 

“Scared of what?” Ironwood prompts, just like she’d told him to. Adam might know how to play the pity card, how to manipulate those around him into feeling sorry for him when he needed it that way. He knew how to make them feel afraid otherwise. It wasn’t like Yang was not also familiar with tragedies. She had lived through them too. The difference between herself and Adam is that she didn’t want to burden the world with the wrongdoings that were meant just for her. Yang would rather carry them on her own then lay them down for someone else to struggle beneath. It was easier than submitting to weakness.

 

“I was scared he would hurt Blake.” She sets them on the ground, the weight rising from her shoulders. “I thought...I was sure he was going to kill her.”

 

“I believe we have some audio recordings from your voicemail you wished to use to support your stance?” Ironwood prompts, and Yang nods, flinching against the memory of when she had first heard the voice coming from her speakers, the chills that ran down her spine, the fear that settled in her muscles, filled in the fissures.

 

Fighting her eyes shutting, from turning away from it, Yang looks to Blake, and they face the reminder of those words, of the worry they lived in every day after they first heard them.

 

Adam’s voice is a threatening murmur, a sickeningly sweet taunt of a warning—stay away, send her to me, keep your hands off of her.

 

The next critiques how Yang has done with his instructions, threatens to come after her, to “teach her a lesson.” Why can’t she learn? Why don’t they stop while they’re ahead?

 

And the last one, the last one still makes her want to take Blake’s hand and run away until the end of the earth, until the ground has vanished, the ocean’s run dry. The last one sets her soul on fire and puts it out with a singular gust of fear whipping its way through her core, knocking her bones against each other, shaking her muscles loose. “If you don’t stay away once and for all, I will make you stand by and watch her suffer for your mistakes, Yang. I will not hesitate to kill her if that’s what it takes for you to figure out what I’m trying to tell you.”

 

The jury is murmuring to themselves, writing on their pads, eyebrows drawn in concern. The judge leans back in his seat, Yang’s dad sits in the audience before her with wide eyes, Ruby is pale, shaking and clutches Weiss’ hand.

 

Blake lets her tears fall and does not move to wipe them away. Yang does the same.

 

Weakness, it turns out, is apart of the truth.

 

\--

 

_18_

 

The two of them lay across Yang’s dorm room bed, comforter half drawn around Blake’s body as she curls on her side, one leg draped over Yang, head nestled against her shoulder, arm across her chest.

 

This degree of pressed close and tangled together maybe should be weird. Six months into their first year of college and they’ve both stopped questioning it.

 

Yang’s smashing buttons on her scroll, attempting to complete her combo and knock out Ruby without jostling Blake’s head too much. “That was blatant cheating!” Yang shouts, forgetting all about Blake’s comfort as she angles her scroll down, thumbs moving in quick succession as she sends her avatar's foot slamming into Ruby’s character’s face.

 

“That was a perfectly legal move, Yang,” Ruby argues, sounding far too justified in her argument, a little too like Weiss, if Yang was honest. It wasn’t that she minded that her dormmate was weirdly befriending her younger sister. It was just a little unexpected. “Not my fault if you suck.”

 

There was Ruby.

 

“Can you please just win already?” Blake whines, lifting her head from Yang’s shoulder to glare in her direction. “I’m getting motion sickness taking a nap over here.”

 

Yang encourages for Blake to settle back against her with a nudge of her arm.

 

“Oh, hey, Blake!” Ruby says through the speaker, voice surprised. “I didn’t know you were over.”

 

An intentional forfeit of information. “I didn’t know she was coming,” Yang deadpans, “apparently she just shows up these days.” It’s meant to sound casual, to convince Yang of the fact that this is nothing special. _This,_ whatever it may be, was friendship reforming, growth from ashes that had been swept aside. It meant nothing that Blake’s closeness calmed the rushing in Yang’s bloodstream. There was no hidden truth buried in Yang’s fast beating heart. No reason that she kept flashing back to her lips pressed against Blake’s, scrawny limbs reaching out to her.

 

“God knows why,” Blake murmurs, breath running across the exposed skin of Yang’s neck. Goosebumps rise up even though the air is warm.

 

“Fuck you!” Yang screams as the loud proclamation of “K.O.” comes from the scroll’s speakers. “I hate you and your cheating ways.”

 

“Not my fault you don’t play more defensively,” Ruby counters, her chirp of a voice almost the verbal representation of a shrug. “One day, you’ll learn.”

 

Yang harrumphs, her free hand now running along Blake’s back, twisting in the ends of her hair, trying its best to seem like an action made without purpose. She didn’t want Blake to be aware of the fact that it required too much energy to fight against touching more of her for so long. “I’ll talk to you later, you little brat.”

 

“Don’t be a sore loser.”

 

“Too late. I’m taking you out of my will. All of my belongings have hereby been left to Blake Belladonna.”

 

Ruby gasps. “You mean I won’t acquire your hole-filled softball T-shirt from junior high? What about the drawer of your nightstand filled with old receipts?”

 

“I’m hanging up on you.”

 

“How will I go on without the sweaty tennis shoes that will forever memorialize my sister? The horror of-”

 

Yang hits the end call button before Ruby can continue any longer, smiling at the barely hidden laughter that had been in her sister’s voice. “She’s such a brat.”

 

“Something in your genes really brings that trait out in your family,” Blake mumbles, nuzzling further against Yang, sighing again. “You smell different.”

 

For most friends, that might be a strange comment, but it wasn’t uncommon for them to exist with their faces buried against one another. “Ran out of my soap. I borrowed Weiss’s.”

 

Blake draws in a long inhale, an experiment. “I don’t like it,” she declares in an exhale.

 

“Good thing you didn’t use it then,” Yang says with a roll of her eyes. She’s hungry, stomach rolling, but doesn’t want to move just yet.

 

With a hum, Blake takes another breath. “I don’t like it on _you_.”

 

It doesn’t mean anything special. Yang hopes the burst from her heart isn’t noticeable. “I’m sorry. Next time I’ll be sure to check in with you before borrowing soap.”

 

“Good.” Her voice is sleepy, half there. Another deep breath. “It covers up your scent too much.” Never has Yang been so aware of how she may or may not smell, never had she considered how close of attention Blake was paying to it. “‘S still there though. Just hidden.”

 

“Go to sleep, babe.”

 

She does.

 

When they go out for dinner, Blake directs Yang straight to the drug store after, marching up to the register with a bottle of Yang’s body wash in hand.

 

\--

 

_11_

 

The waves lap against the sand with a little more intensity today, a ferocity as they rise before rushing back down, bubbling foam breaking on the surface and reaching out to touch toes, ankles, calves. So many people complained on days when the ocean was like this.

 

Their favorite beach was only a twenty-minute drive from the Belladonna’s, and Blake’s parents had been taking them for years now. Kali calls after them as they go running towards the water, sunscreen barely rubbed in before they’re ready to surrender themselves to the cool, salt water.

 

Ruby squeals, always afraid of the bigger waves after getting wiped out a time or two a few summers ago. She jumps over the waves, kicks up water at Yang and Blake with pointed toes. The ice cream truck’s music filters down towards them and Ruby’s eyes widen, galloping towards Kali who waits with an unsurprised raised eyebrow and a five dollar bill in hand.

 

“Be careful!” Kali calls out to Yang when she’s cartwheeling at the edge of the water; handprints pressed into the wet, malleable sand below before being washed away. “Doctor’s orders, young lady!”

 

Yang rolls her eyes but stops flipping around. Her cast had come off two weeks prior, and she’d been told to air on the side of caution—advice she hadn’t exactly taken to heart.

 

With Yang’s arms folded over her chest, Blake reaches forward, pulls a hand free to hold in her own. “Maybe cartwheels aren’t the best idea?” she suggests, her tone a cross between uncertain and teasing. “I mean, is there even a point if there’s no roof?”

 

“Jump off of _one_ roof, and you all just can’t let it go.” Yang huffs and rolls her eyes like she’s annoyed but quickly smiles at Blake to fill her in on the truth. “C’mon,” she tugs Blake’s hand towards the water, both of them squealing as the incoming wave washes up past their knees, towards their thighs.

 

There’s a hesitancy in Blake’s step, but she lets Yang pull her forward. “The ocean’s strong today.”

 

“The ocean is always strong,” Yang counters. “Some days it just makes more of a show of it.”

 

“Like you?” Blake shoots back, and Yang doesn’t know if she means it as an insult or a compliment.

 

“Yes,” Yang says with confidence. “I am the ocean.”

 

Blake bends forward, dropping Yang’s hand to splash water in Yang’s direction. Yang flinches in response to cold water on her stomach, eyes narrowing at the challenge Blake has just presented. “For being the ocean, you sure don’t handle getting soaked very well.”

 

And now Yang has no choice but to race after Blake, the peels of laughter welcoming the rush of water Yang sends in Blake’s direction, her arms wrapping around Blake’s middle and dragging her towards the waves.

 

“Yang!” Blake screeches, and Yang’s arms drop immediately, following after Blake with arms pumping and legs sprinting to get away from the oncoming water building higher and higher before crashing to the earth.

 

It soaks them up to their chests and Blake yelps, running further out the second the water starts to pull back. She’s glaring, but Yang just sticks out her tongue. “You started it, Belladonna.”

 

Maybe it’s not the best response because, in a flash, Blake is running towards Yang, arms extended to grab her and dunk her back into the water. Yang runs, feet slamming against the sand that molds around each step, water splashing up and hitting her legs as she laughs until she almost can’t breathe. Eventually, she gives up and lets Blake grab ahold of her, dragging her towards the water while Yang dramatically calls out for someone to save her.

 

Blake drops her unceremoniously in the shallow end, giggling at Yang screeching against the sand and the cold, hands shoving water in Blake’s direction in some half-hearted retaliation. “You aren’t a very good ocean,” Blake says, grabbing Yang’s hand and screwing her face up in anticipation as a wave comes washing over them, not strong enough to pull them away, but Blake’s hold on Yang’s hand is tight enough to keep her there regardless.

 

“Maybe not,” Yang says, running a hand down her face to wipe the water from her eyes and staring up at Blake. “But if I’m the ocean, then you’re the moon.”

 

There’s a moment for processing before Blake’s lips make a small ‘o’ of realization. “Why’s that?” she asks even though Yang has already seen the comprehension come and go.

 

“You know why,” Yang says instead of justifying the question with an answer. She wasn’t ready to say that maybe she was the strength of an ocean, but she bent to the will of the moon above. Yang wasn’t yet able to verbalize that she was only as strong as her currents, only as powerful as her tide.

 

“Yeah,” Blake whispers, corners of her mouth landing in a smile.

 

A wave takes them both out, rolls them around in its embrace and dumps them back out with sand burns on their knees and sputtering coughs. They laugh, leaving behind the suggestion presented a moment earlier. They both know what Yang meant. The rivers of truth wash over them and whisk them away in a current they can’t fight, not that they try to.

 

\--

 

_24_

 

“No more questions,” Blake groans, face down into a pillow, words muffled. “No one is allowed to ask me a question for the rest of my life.”

 

Yang laughs, wishing these moments didn’t have to mirror the past, that she didn’t immediately flash back to study sessions in college or sleepovers on Blake’s bedroom floor. “I second that,” Yang sighs, falling back against the carpet of the living room, staring at the white ceiling above, the same from the first day they had moved in and had spent the night curled in sleeping bags before the electric had even been turned on.

 

Coming back to the apartment had simply happened. There was no grand invitation, no proper moment of acknowledgment, just a look between them before Blake followed Yang out of the courthouse and they walked in silence right up to the fourth floor and Yang unlocked the door, flipped on the light, held it open for Blake to step in if she so chose.

 

Yang doesn’t make a single move for the bedroom, even though just a few nights ago Blake had been naked beneath those sheets, Yang wasn’t ready to have her back there in any other tendency, wasn’t ready for her to exist in there in any other capacity again.

 

So they end up camped out in the living room. Yang orders a pizza. They sit on the floor and eat the whole thing, just the two of them. Eventually, talk of tomorrow weaves its way back in.

 

“I hate Corsac,” Blake says, voice whining. Yang doesn’t fight the quirk of her lips, lets her hand inch forward and pat against Blake’s shoulder in momentary comfort.

 

“There, there,” she says though she knows exactly what Blake means, how she feels. There was no forgetting how Corsac had torn Blake apart last time. “Ironwood has us prepped and ready for battle.”

 

It’s only been a week since the last time, since the arguments she and Blake had been willing to offer up were ripped apart in moments as they tried so hard to keep everything else close to their chests, hidden from the rest of the world.

 

“I’m gonna fail.”

 

“No, you’re not.” It really was like college all over again. “Don’t let him get under your skin.”

 

Blake pops up from the pillow, hair mussed, sticking out in disarray. “That’s _your_ problem,” Blake answers. “He started asking me questions last time and I just…”

 

Yang reaches out, her hand falling against the inside of Blake’s arm. It was getting easier, touching her. There was still a searing pain behind her fingers, a longing spasming within her chest, breaking and trembling at the knowledge that soon this will end again, but she can bury her flesh beside Blake’s and feel less like crying, like breaking. “I get it. It’s like we’re back in that room.”

 

Alone, just the two of them before they realized it was three. They weren’t alone enough.

 

“Reliving it is-”

 

“Yeah, I know.”

 

Blake bites her lip, crosses her legs beneath her and moves closer. Her knee presses into the side of Yang’s thigh. “Those nightmares I used to have…” she trails off, direction gone as soon as it had been found. “Yang, that moment was every fear I’d ever had realized all at once.”

 

Oh, I know, Yang wants to say. _I have never closed my eyes and managed to see anything since._ “Liar,” she says instead. “There was not a single spider crawling out of your ears.”

 

Blake’s mouth is open, wheels in her head turning as she seems to take in Yang’s joke, how inappropriately timed it was. And then an eyebrow raises, one of her ears twitches, and she breaks into laughter, face splitting wide in a smile. “Jesus Christ, Yang,” she says. “I bear my soul to you, and _that’s_ what you come back with.”

 

_Please, that’s not even the beginning of your soul. I have seen its depths. I know how much more is hidden within._ “I haven’t heard you laugh in so long.” Yang’s soul has never been very good at hiding in the dark; the shadows needed to be aired out, the secrets set free. “Some days I thought I was going to die without it.”

 

“Oh.” It’s not a real response, but Yang’s words have settled into Blake and found a home.

 

Yang clears her throat, shifts. “Sorry.”

 

“No, I’m-”

 

“Stop while you’re behind, Belladonna.”

 

“Fuck.”

 

Yang shakes her head, taken aback. “Excuse me?”

 

Blake shifts up onto her knees, the added height utilized to stare down at Yang, tongue running along her lips. “I know how you flirt. Stop calling me beautiful already.”

 

Yang rolls her eyes. “I’m _not_ flirting with you. I barely even _like_ you anymore.”

 

“Friday night said something very different.”

 

“Friday night needs to learn to keep its whore mouth shut.” Right now was not when they should be thinking about Friday. Yang didn’t need a reminder of what it was like to have Blake’s skin beneath her, hair tangled around her, fingers buried within her. Now was not when Yang needed a single reminder of what completion felt like when they were currently stuck in this awkward in-between of halfway there.

 

Blake smirks, fingers reaching out, dancing on Yang’s knee. “I don’t know if we can really call Friday night the whore in this situation.”

 

Now Yang is the one laughing. She had never been any good at resisting Blake’s snark. “Oh, shut up.”

 

There’s a teasing to Blake’s lips. Her body leans slightly forward, weight pressed into her hands. “Should I actually say ‘make me’ or is it implied or-”

 

Oh, she would make her alright. Yang reaches a hand behind Blake’s head, pulls her towards her, presses them together. She unworks her legs from beneath her as their lips part; tongues meet, sighs of contentment fill the room.

 

It’s probably not a good idea, but Yang hadn’t exactly spent the last two years of her life with a primary focus in good ideas. She submits to the bad wholeheartedly, swallowing her claim of hardly liking Blake whole. That was a lie they both needn’t even consider; it’d already been disputed before crossing Yang’s lips.

 

Blake buries herself against Yang, practically crawls her way into Yang’s lap, settles there, hands cradling Yang’s face, holding her close but gentle. The swelling inside of her makes Yang forget all about ice and fire, thoughts of hurt and pain chased away. The warmth radiates from a source only Blake can ignite, constant but never burning, never singeing. Her eyes open and find gold irises staring back at her, pupils blown. Yang knows the longing, the love, the desire—it runs through them both. It is deep within their veins, superficially buried in their cheeks, spread all along their hands as they roam over each other’s body.

 

“I don’t think this is what Ironwood meant by prep,” Blake whispers against Yang’s lips, just barely pulling back.

 

Yang has no time to worry about that right now. “So help me god if you ever bring Ironwood up again while I’m kissing you...”

 

The air stalls. Blake’s inhale stuttering and freezing. The concept of a future was released, a future that was supposed to be forever vanished and eternally forgotten.

 

Everyday Yang worked to set herself free from it, to hold onto the fact that it was a concept unrealized. Now is when she grasps that it was a promise never relinquished. She wanted it too desperately, had believed it too fully. Until it was twined around her heart, absorbed into her marrow, created as apart of her flesh. She had never given up this future for a single second. The hope of living it out was apart of her as much as her heart and her lungs and her brain. The hope could not manage to be cut away as easily as an arm. Yang stands, pulling Blake up with her, pressing another kiss against her lips while guiding her to a room that was once entirely theirs.

 

Blake lays beneath Yang on the bed, the dying sunlight streams through in orange hues. It catches the lightness in Blake’s eyes, sinks into the deep black of her hair.

 

“I can live without my arm,” Yang says as she pulls Blake’s shirt over her head, as Yang’s lips bury against Blake’s neck and her collarbone and her chest. “Forget arms. I have another one,” she declares as she unbuttons Blake’s pants, slides them past her hips, kicks them to the side as Blake wiggles out of them, underwear following. Her lips trail along Blake’s ribs, bury against her scars, tease down her stomach.

 

Muscles tense beneath her. Blake’s hips search for contact, for pressure. Yang finds her, holds her with her tongue, her lips. There’s love escaping when she means to choke it back, need slipping out with the tender rush of her hands over Blake’s skin, hope reaching out in the form of a moan.

 

“There’s only one you,” Yang whispers into the atmosphere, lets the words and their implications break into the moment and the pretense of pure physicality fall away just as it’s meant to. They will never be just touch, never reduced to merely tactile.

 

Blake falls apart against Yang’s tongue with a gasp of Yang’s name, a moan of pleasure, a tightening of her muscles and a desperate grab of her hands. She loses herself to words and insinuations and hopes that sink within the sheets, escape from her body like the moans of pleasure slipping past her lips.

 

“And for fuck’s sake, Belladonna,” Yang keeps going when the world has stilled, a single second before Blake is undressing her, fingers messy and disorganized as she strips Yang bare, worships her skin, her flesh. “If I’ve learned a single damn thing in my life, it’s that I can’t live without you.”

 

Blake kisses Yang when she comes later, tensing around fingers buried deep, riding a high that she’s forgotten as she sighs Blake’s name into her mouth. “It’d be awfully nice if you’d stop making me,” Yang says as a final punctuation, not giving Blake a single second to respond before she’s consuming every bit of her that she can, holding her close, reveling in this same flesh being buried within her again, these same lips marking her skin, claiming her.

 

“Don’t ever bother thinking about my fucking arm again, baby,” Yang leans up to whisper into Blake’s ear while she’s got her fingers buried, while she works Blake towards another precipice. “Just remember my heart.” She spills out against Yang, cries into her ear, fingers pulling in Yang’s hair.

 

“Remember that it’s yours.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apparently I'm only capable of posting on Wednesdays. It has been a hell of a couple weeks but now I've got a funeral behind me and I am a college graduate (again) so hopefully things will calm down soon. We're getting really close to the end which is both exciting and horrifying on my end. I hope people are still enjoying this and where we're going. Your comments help keep me sane. Have a great rest of your week!


	11. Chapter 11

_21_

 

“Senior year came around like, overnight,” Yang says, shifting against the thin lines of rope crisscrossing beneath her and jostling Blake for the fifth time.

 

“Hold still,” Blake says, reaching out and grabbing Yang’s hand, calming her. “Find a constellation and name it after me.”

 

Yang leans over, presses a kiss to Blake’s cheek. “They’re all for you,” she says simply. “Especially that one.”

 

“The North Star? Isn’t that a little cliche?”

 

The netting moves with Yang’s shrug. “That would require I know the North Star on sight, which I do not. I just picked the brightest one.”

 

“Still cliche.”

 

“So is star-gazing,” Yang quips. “And yet.”

 

The air was chilly, and Blake eased her body closer, letting Yang warm her. “I think I’m ready to hurry up and graduate.” Blake sighs the admission.

 

“Oh?” This wasn’t the first Yang was hearing about Blake’s need to get away, her desire to move on again, outrun the demon that was always on the fray, ready to drag her back down, wanted nothing more than to trap her entirely, eternally.

 

“Yeah.” This time, he was trying to take Yang down with them. The nightmare had shifted. It grew dimmer, heavier. Her worst reality had cracked open, dug with ragged, cracked fingernails deep beneath darkness and failure and loss. It brought towards the light fears that were never supposed to be regarded as possible. “We should go somewhere else.” We should get away before death can catch us both.

 

Yang places her head on Blake’s shoulder; more turned towards her than the sky above. “Like where?” she asks softly, the promise of tomorrow set free with ease.

 

“Somewhere we don’t have to worry,” Blake whispers. “Away from him.”

 

“Baby,” Yang says, presses a kiss to Blake’s chest beneath her. “You’re safe. We’re safe.”

 

How? Blake wants to demand the answer, insist on Yang’s surety, remind her of what Adam is capable of. “The police won’t listen to us. He could be here right now, Yang. I feel like he’s always a step away...like he’s just waiting to grab us.”

 

It smells like summer as the breeze stirs the air, floral scents and freshly cut grass wafting up and greeting them. It tries to drift Blake back to being a kid, to being carefree...to being safe. It’s been a hundred lifetimes since she was last safe. She would take a thousand more if it meant Yang would be sheltered from the coming storm, guarded against the downfall. There’s no point trying to ignore the hot breath of the beast behind you.

 

“I’ll protect you,” Yang vows. “He can’t hurt you while I’m here.”

 

He is still there. Still ready. Still waiting.

 

Blake breaks in an instant, spiraling down without a second thought. “You heard him, Yang. He threatened to _kill_ you. I-I can’t-don’t you dare protect me.”

 

“Shh,” Yang soothes her, hands cupping her face, thumbs running over her cheekbones, lips pressing where her tears fall. “If anything happens we’ll stand our own and then they’ll have to take us more seriously.”

 

“But what if-”

 

“Blake, I’m not letting him scare me away from you,” Yang says with a deep inflection to her voice. They both know what her words really mean. _I will not let him scare_ you _away from_ me. “I will _not_ let him take you from me again.” Her tone is stern, decided. “He gets to take nothing else from us. I’ve decided.”

 

“You can’t just-” Blake starts to argue.

 

“Too late. Already did.” Yang kisses her, soft and sweet with a touch of urgency. There’s a fear behind it like Yang worries she’ll pull back and Blake will already have slipped away. “Nothing is worth losing you, Blake. I would trade my life for your safety.”

 

“I don’t _want_ you too. I would-I would...”

 

“I would be half of a person without you.”

 

It’d be easy to call her out on being dramatic, but Blake knows what she means. She knows because she’s thought of slipping away before Adam makes good on his threats, before a reality catches up to them that neither of them want to live in. But she can’t leave Yang any more than she can lose her. It’s been four years of finding herself again, and Yang has been steadfastly by her side, the only piece that held steady as the rest shifted into place. There was so much of her that was lost, that she had to surrender to pick up something new, to find who she had been and who she wanted to be. To become more than anything he has ever touched, ever tainted.

 

“Promise me you won’t do anything stupid,” Blake begs her. She can’t leave, unable to rip herself away, but she can try and make Yang protect herself.

 

“Me?” Yang almost sounds affronted.

 

“Yes, Reckless Xiao Long. You.” Yang laughs above her, still so light, not weighed down by the constant threat that Blake feels looming, worries will finally close around them at any second. “Promise me. If anything happens, you’ll put yourself first.”

 

“I won’t jump off of any more roofs for you.” How did she do that? So light, so weightless.

 

“Promise me,” Blake implores, hands gripping the arms that hold Yang in place above Blake. Yang didn’t know the weight that Adam could hold over you; Blake had every intention of making sure it stayed that way. Her nightmares were to remain her own. They weren’t meant to stretch and grow until the shadows had swallowed them both.

 

Yang kisses her with sweet lips, a sugar-coated tongue. “I promise.”

 

“What do you promise?” Blake pushes for more, for a chance to sleep at night. If he shows up, run. If he comes for me, don’t look back.

 

“I’ll prioritize myself.”

 

The need to separate rushes from Blake with an exhale. Keep out of the crosshairs; don’t become his target. Let me take this burden before it captures you, destroys you, kills you. “We should go down to the police station again tomorrow. Maybe someone else will be there, and they’ll listen to the recording.”

 

“Okay, Blake.” Yang kisses her again. “We’ll try again in the morning.”

 

It’s not enough because there is still tonight. “I’m so scared.”

 

“I’m here,” Yang promises, body close and hands gentle. “It’s okay.” She lays back down, nudges Blake to urge her onto her chest, wraps her arms around her. “Tell me more about this future you’ve been working on.”

 

“How much do you want to hear?”

 

Yang sighs, a rush of happiness, contentment circling them. “All of it, Belladonna. I want it all.”

 

\--

 

_24_

 

There’s something about confessions. As soon as secrets have seen the light, despite how poorly they may have hidden before, they refuse to go back into the dark.

 

Yang wants to stuff every last admission back under the bed, let them collect cobwebs on the highest shelves, let them be forgotten in the deepest corners.

 

But now the truths live in this world. They have taken root. They flourish in the oxygen, grow towards the light. Once allotted the freedom, it was near impossible to coax one back into seclusion. The sincerity breathes in the room between them, sits on the bedside table, pokes its head out from the book propped to the exact page Blake had left it on. You know we are here, they say from the sleeve of Blake’s flannel tossed over a chair. Don’t you dare make us vanish again.

 

“Yang,” Blake starts once her breathing has slowed, her limbs have some control regained.

 

“Mmm,” is the best response she has. “Say it again.”

 

Blake bites her lip, eyes shifting along Yang’s body before settling on her face, holding her eyes. Oh, there I am, she seems to say as she eases through the look alone. There is my truth. You have held it this whole time. “Yang...”

 

“There are things I didn’t even know I could miss,” Yang admits. It isn’t hard to read the answer in Blake’s eyes. She knows exactly what Yang is referencing, has experienced it for herself.

 

“Like what?” she asks, the pads of her fingers ghosting over Yang’s bare arms until shivers break out. “I knew every part of you I would miss,” Blake admits.

 

“Then how did you do it?” Yang demands. She had no choice in her loss, and it tore her apart every single day. How, _why_ , would Blake choose the same for herself? How was this a choice someone could make, over and over?

 

Of the two of them, Blake cried more easily, broke down with the prodding. Now she holds steady; she does not flinch. Now, Yang is the one who wants to submit to tears and sadness and vulnerability.  “I had to,” Blake whispers.

 

“Bullshit.”

 

“Yang-”

 

“Again.”

 

“Yang, baby.”

 

It’s been two years of tying back her vulnerability. “I don’t understand.” It’s relinquished in a handful of words and tears on her cheeks.

 

“Yang.”

 

She’s missed this, them, so much. It hurts to take it back. “Make me understand.”

 

“Yang.”

 

The word is pressed into her skin, the ache pulsing in her stomach. “I regret your choices more than I regret any of my own.”

 

“Yang.”

 

Blake’s hand runs down metal. Yang’s grip close around Blake when it reaches her hand, twines their fingers together. “You left me.”

 

“Yang.”

 

“Abandoned me.”

 

“Yang.”

 

“It hurts, Blake,” she cries truly now. Her sobs and tears overwhelming, carving her open from the inside out and leaving her bare. “Only you could hurt me like this. You were the only one who has ever had that power.”

 

Blake’s fingers reach up and wipe Yang’s tears, leaves her own in place. She holds Yang’s face tenderly, looking down at her—eyes molten, pure, liquidized gold that regards the woman who stares back to be worth it all, every ounce of precious metal. “Yang.”

 

“Blake,” she answers back and her chest heaves, confessions dancing around them, stirring within them. There’s no holding it in, not when it grows this much, not when it demands to come loose. “I missed the sleepy sighs when you settled against my side. I missed your scent in my pillow, in the couch, in _me_. I missed how your ears quirked when I made you laugh really hard and the snarky comments you’d say just loud enough for me to hear.”

 

“Yang.”

 

“I missed you holding my name, saying it.”

 

Blake turns herself against Yang, buries face into her shoulder, lips pressing urgently to her neck, peppered little kisses in quick succession.

 

“I missed you, Blake. All of you, every fucking strand of hair and goddamn cell and-”

 

_And these soft, open lips, parted just for me to fit between._

 

“Don’t make me miss you again,” Yang cries between her lips, the tears never relenting, only lessening. “It destroyed me.”

 

“I know,” Blake says this with her forehead pressed against Yang, eyes open, truth wide.

 

“You _ruined_ me.”

 

Blake nods, doesn’t look away. “I ruined a lot of things.”

 

There’s a whole history buried in those words, several lifetimes, the stopping and starting of the spin of the earth beneath their feet—all of that lives within her sentence. Yang knows there are a hundred things to address, a million answers that could be right or wrong or anywhere in between. She knows how it makes her feel, what it makes her want to say back.

 

She leans in, connects for another kiss before pulling back, resting her forehead against Blake’s. “Do you remember what I used to say to you?”

 

Blake blinks, and the words swirl all around them, the options are endless. Yang said so much, meant it all, said it again.

 

“I’ll still be forgiven.” Blake reaches out her hand and grabs just the right words from the air around them, takes them straight from Yang’s heart and says them before she gets a chance to.

 

Yang crumbles beneath. She’s never been strong enough to offer anything else. She has never wanted to fight this instinctive inclination to give Blake her all. Yang’s body shakes, quivering in the surrender, going slack as her white flag waves. Yang looks to Blake with her lower lip trembling, her face transformed into a distorted, broken mess. A sob slips out as Yang opens her mouth and says, “About time you figured it out.”

 

\--

 

_21_

 

Vacuo wasn’t a premeditated destination. Blake had walked out of that hospital and took the thirty-minute cab ride home in a blur, hands shaking, heart racing. The cab waited outside for her to pack a bag, and then she was directing him towards the airport.

 

Vacuo wasn’t the goal, but when Blake had opened up her contact list, Sun was the only name she felt like she could call. The next flight left an hour later. Blake was on it.

 

The first thought she has stepping off the airship is that it’s _hot._ Not summer in Vale hot. That sort of heat clung to your skin, frizzed up your hair, weighed you down beneath the heaviness of water in the air. Walking outside in the summertime in Vale could feel like swimming through the air, the scent of damp dirt stuck in your nose, sweat clinging to your skin, never having a chance to evaporate off in a breeze.

 

Vacuo is all heat. The air is dry, the dampness replaced with burning sun. Five minutes outside and the back of her throat is scratchy, her eyes irritated. It was a warmth that didn’t weigh her down but soaked through to her marrow, impacting on the cellular level so everything that she creates from here on out will be ten degrees hotter.

 

The draw of Vacuo was still unclear. Maybe it was the fact that it was literally as far from Vale as she could get without drowning herself in the middle of the ocean, maybe not. Jury was still out.

 

What she knows is that one of her only friends lives here. The rest of her friends were either also Yang’s friends or still had ties to the White Fang. Not to say that Sun was a backup but, well, he was safe and that was her main priority right now.

 

The duffel bag is heavy on her back, the strap clinging to her shoulder as it soaks through with sweat.

 

Sun’s waiting outside beside his little red joke of a car, sign in hand that reads, “Squatter party of 1” in big, block letters.

 

With a shake of her head, she throws her duffel into the backseat, grateful that he doesn’t go for a hug or any physical sign of affection, just bats the top of her head with his cardboard sign and climbs into the driver’s side.

 

“Welcome to Vacuo!” he says, rolling the windows down and letting the hot, stagnant air exchange for hot, circulating air. “Is it all you dreamed?” He throws his head back, a dumb smile on his face as he bats his eyes at her.

 

She snorts. “Aside from you being here it’s pretty decent,” she shoots back. Outside the window, she sees the differences in the landscape. The lifeless land, brittlebush and cactuses and marigolds all the same rough shade of dead, withering brown with the tinges of green or gold, never quite standing out as pure color. Any second now she’s pretty much expecting a tumbleweed to go rolling across the street. It’s pretty in its own way, though. There’s red, rocky mountains jutting from the ground. They drive straight through them, tall walls of solid rock with rough edges and an orange hue surrounding either side.

 

“So what made you decide to come check out the best continent in Remnant?”

 

Blake crosses her arm over her chest, wrapping a hand around her upper arm. She shrugs, tries to play it casual, tries not to think about the gauze still taped against her stomach or the deep, radiating ache in her chest. At the hospital, they kept asking her to rate her pain on a scale of 1-10. She said her wound was a 6. They asked if anything else hurt. She stared at the ceiling and tried not to cry.

 

“Needed a change of pace,” she answers, clearing her throat. “Got sick of the whole college thing.”

 

His eyebrows shoot up, eyes shifting from the road to her. “Really? ‘Cause that doesn’t sound like you.”

 

Outside the scene transitions from empty, dry wasteland to city. Blake stares at the reflection of the sun bouncing off of one of the glass-paned skyscrapers. “No.” Her eyes water against the brightness. “It doesn’t.” She doesn’t look away.

 

\--

 

_24_

 

No part of Blake wants to slip out of Yang’s bed once the sun has fully set, once the front door opens and Ruby’s laughter filters in. An appropriate time to return to Sun’s has come and gone. But she can’t stay the night here; can’t ask that of Yang just yet, not when she has already given so much.

 

“I’ll see you in the morning,” Blake says, her lips an inch from Yang’s.

 

“I’ll miss you until then,” Yang answers and Blake has no choice but to lean in, to kiss her again.

 

She slips out of the apartment, carries her heels off an index finger as she wanders down the sidewalk.  Yang had offered to drive her, but instead, Blake makes a slow and steady pace towards a different destination. The Uber shows up a couple of minutes later and Blake dozes in the back seat as they wander through the dark, winding roads to the west side of the island.

 

When they arrive, Blake thanks the driver, hooks her heels on the end of her finger again and lets the door slip shut behind her. The wood steps creak beneath her feet as she steps forward, the knock rings out against her knuckles.

 

There’s several seconds where she hears no response, but then the porch light switches on and someone peers through the blinds before opening the door wide. Her mom’s arms are open and waiting before the door has even fully swung free.

 

Blake rushes into her mother’s arms and finds comfort.

 

“There you are.” Her mom welcomes her in, sees the pain and suffering for what they are and takes them upon herself.

 

Blake had run from them. She was convinced her sins were unforgivable the first time, astounded when they welcomed her back in with urgency. They were happy to see her again and relieved she came home.

 

The second time she’s confident she’s drawn a line in the sand for everyone. Blake hadn’t been able to face them, not when they were a part of her past that she was running away from, not when they had ties to Yang. She hides herself away with the knowledge that she can’t answer their questions, will go weak with their pleas for her to return home. Yes, I will come back. Yes, staying away has hurt more than the blade through my side. Yes, I need you. Yes, tell Yang I’m coming.

 

But then her mom was in Vacuo, standing in the living room of Sun’s tiny townhouse with her sunglasses pushed on top of her head and her eyebrows cinched together in concern as she talked to Neptune. She was there to offer forgiveness Blake had never even bothered asking for. _Your faults will never make me stop loving you. Your flaws do not define you._

 

“You’ve done so well,” Kali whispers against her daughter’s ear, places a kiss at the top of her head as she guides Blake through the door. “You’re almost done, Blake.”

 

“I’ve hurt her so much,” Blake cries for the second time, lets the admission tear her from the inside out as she admits it to her mother and herself all over again. “Why does she still love me?”

 

Her parents were always about gentleness. “Oh, sweetie, how could she not?”

 

“You heard her today,” Blake cries. She had held it together as best possible in that courtroom and after, anytime Yang was looking at her Blake held herself as strong as she could, tried to offer that same security Yang had always extended, even when she had none left for herself. “She has hurt _so_ much. Because of me and-and what I’ve done and-”

 

“You do not accept the responsibilities for the acts of others,” her mom says with a hand smoothing over Blake’s hair, a gentle swaying motion on her feet. “Yang knows as well as anyone else that you never wanted any of this.”

 

“She’s hurt so much.” Blake cries, not caring who has caused the hurt. She doesn’t give a shit about origination right now. She disintegrates under the fact that Yang has suffered at all. “So much pain. She never deserved any of it.”

 

Kali rocks her, attempts to soothe her. “Neither did you, darling. Remember that. Neither did you.”

 

_I don’t care about me_ , Blake bites back, acknowledging such a statement would help no one. “She hurt so much, and I made it worse, Mom.”

 

“And now,” her mom answers, pulling away and pressing a kiss to her daughter’s forehead, wiping away her tears with a gentle swipe. “Now you get to make it better.”

 

“How?” Blake demands even though she knows there aren’t answers.

 

Her mom has one anyway. “You stay.”

 

\--

 

_17_

 

“I’ve missed this,” Yang admits sometime around two in the morning.

 

They’d spent hours talking. Not about themselves necessarily, they weren’t ready for that, but about music and magic and how the stars always shine the brightest when the rest of the world is at its darkest. (So maybe they do talk about themselves, tucked in between the dialogue, hidden away in the subtext of truth.)

 

_I’ve missed you,_ is what neither of them says even though they think it; they feel it. It’s a knowledge Blake isn’t ready to face, a reality of what she sacrificed, what was taken from her.

 

They lay on their sides, facing each other, like ten year olds at a sleepover. The memory feels like it could be happening concurrently as if time hasn’t passed at all. It’s remained still with the two of them wrapped away in their own little world.

 

The knowledge of how far past those times are peels a shred of Blake’s heart back, tugs away at the muscle, leaving it weaker, exposed. “Yang, I’m-”

 

“Shh,” the whisper is so quiet Blake wonders if she’s imagined it, if there’s a breeze blowing through the branches, a car driving through the rain in the distance.

 

“Not now,” Yang says, a hand coming up to press against Blake’s cheek, gentle, but there.

 

It’d be so easy to fight, to argue her side, to get the words off her chest and let them live in the world where they can begin to do their work, to show their truth.

 

It’s not enough. It will never be enough, not for all that has happened, all she has been apart of. All she has missed. It doesn’t even begin to touch the fraying edges of the fabric needed to cover all the repentance she must offer.

 

“It’s okay,” Yang reassures, thumb running along Blake’s cheekbone, a smile forming at the corner of her lips, buried somewhere behind lilac eyes.

 

Blake has miles and miles to cover and only a few inches to offer.

 

Yang sees her offering and turns it away. It wasn’t enough, but Blake was told none was needed at all.

 

It had been her resolution from the start of tonight to hold herself together, to be more of who she was and less of the tangled mess she’s become. But the words not spoken sing louder than the birds in the trees, shout louder than gunshots, hold her tighter than binds.

 

The words not spoken might just eat Blake alive from the inside out and consume her entirely.

 

She brings her palm up to rest against Yang’s hand and holds it to her.

 

This was hardly a redemption arc. It was exoneration in a touch, absolution in a gentle shush, two words to dispel the gnawing and eliminate the anguish.

 

No one says I missed you.

 

No one says I love you.

 

Blake has never heard those words more clearly than she does right here.

 

\--

 

_24_

 

Corsac has that same sneer as soon as Yang sits in the stands before him, like he’s already sure he can catch her on the line and reel her in.

 

She states her name, and they begin a staring match. For the sake of winning, of playing smarter but not stronger, Yang looks away, turns within herself, looks down at her shaking hands. “Do you have a question or…?”

 

“Yang-”

 

“Ms. Xiao Long.”

 

He gives her a tight smile, a nod. “Ms. Xiao Long. It seems like this has been a difficult week for you.”

 

“Some may say it’s been trying,” Yang says before Ironwood can jump in and declare an objection. Blake rolls her eyes and Yang swears she hears Ruby muttering something along the lines of, “ _Now_ , really?” The jury chuckles.

 

Corsac flashes a smile, no humor present. “You’re a funny one, aren’t you?” Yang doesn’t respond. “Bit of a party girl in college, got into a decent enough amount of trouble in your younger years.”

 

Yang raises an eyebrow. “Are you going to bring up my childhood record of hitting a kid on the playground at seven? Are we that desperate this time around?”

 

Whatever argument he had to offer, she aims to invalidate it before he can start. _Be your own character witness._ Ironwood said that enough it was now ingrained in her head.

 

“I’m simply relaying the fact that you have always had violent tendencies,” he says, voice cool. “Maybe some impulse control issues.”

 

Oh, there’s about a hundred comments tucked away that Yang could set free about how good her impulse control must be considering she hasn’t snapped _his_ neck yet, but she holds it back. “As you may recall from my testimony yesterday,” Yang starts instead, eyes flashing to Ironwood for his nod of approval. “It had a lot less to do with impulse and a whole lot more to do with the fact that I was terrified. We were being threatened long before your client showed up with a sword in hand and a gun strapped to his belt.”

 

“So that gives you the right to initiate a physical altercation?”

 

This line of questioning was enough to make her rip out of her skin, to become fire itself and consume these useless people for what they are worth. He had a sword and a gun. He had threatened their lives. Yang lost her arm; Blake lost her already trembling grasp on her sense of safety. They both lost each other.

 

Open and shut is the only way this trial should have ever gone and any of this ongoing bullshit was a waste of everyone’s time.

 

“Blake was scared for over six months leading up to when Adam cornered us,” Yang tells the jury more than Corsac. “She was on high alert, had nightmares almost every single night. It got to the point where she was afraid to walk to classes. She-she started skipping hers to walk me to mine.”

 

“So you attacked because your girlfriend was afraid?” He attempts to belittle what is being said, to minimize her statements as being petty and inconsequential.

 

“Blake was living in terror, and I was doing everything I could to try and be brave for her...to prove it would be okay when really I didn’t know.” It was a lie, an act. She didn’t feel safe, but she put on the bravado to try and keep their lives intact, to keep Blake from sprinting off and tearing Adam’s attention away from Yang. “I wanted to make her feel safe...protected. When really, I should have just admitted my fear too.”

 

Corsac narrows his eyes, unhappy with where Yang was directing this. He could feel he was losing control, that she was taking it from him.

 

“So sure, say this is my fault if you want.” Ironwood doesn’t groan in response to her words but sits there expectantly, letting her finish, trusting she’ll hold this together. “But say it’s my fault because I didn’t demand the police listen to us. Say it’s my fault because I tried to pretend like things were okay when they really weren’t. You can blame me for being a victim all you want,” Yang declares, eyes holding Corsac’s, not weak or vulnerable but apparent that she was affected by what happened.

 

She had been impacted and pretending otherwise was a lie that helped no one. Pretending like the fear and sadness and trauma didn’t touch you wasn’t enough to keep them from catching up to you eventually. Two years was more than enough proof for Yang. “It doesn’t change the truth, though. It doesn’t ever change the fact that I _am_ a victim or that I have suffered because of it.”

 

He’s backing down, surety wavering. The jury is drawn to what she’s saying, the judge even staring directly to Yang from above. “No one gets to take that from me,” Yang says, and she doesn’t cover the waver in her voice, doesn’t tuck a trembling hand beneath her thigh. She’s shaken, filled with an anger that runs deep but overwhelmed at the weight her words get to have, the truth she is finally able to release. “Not even you.”

 

\--

 

_21_

 

The party was simply happening. Nobody knew who was hosting, where the kegs and Red Solo cups were coming from, really how they had even ended up here in the first place.

 

They’re twenty-one at the time which, in summary, means they are young, dumb, and irresponsible.

 

Weiss takes pride in none of that, less than impressed with herself and the fact that she’s unsteady on her feet, the world swirling around her like a ship at sea when she’s got a midterm in the morning.

 

If nothing else, she’s at least doing better than Yang.

 

Yang who is drunk to the point of concern, sloppy lips locking around the edge of a blunt, drawing hard, like she needs the drug to live, like she’s drowning breathing in the mere oxygen around her.

 

There’s a whole group of them gathered around, pupils blown, hair haphazard, lips loose. The last few years Weiss had gotten to know Yang simultaneously with watching her come alive. As time went on, as she and Blake grew closer, more of Yang burst free, she became bigger, brighter. She was vibrant, filled with smiles and an ease wherever she went. It wasn’t hard to see how they interacted with each other, how well they complemented each other.

 

Weiss had only ever known Yang and Blake as a unit, really. But Ruby had laid the full history out in detail, had described the way the light in Yang’s eyes dimmed, how her spark went out, her personality still intact but weaker, sadder.

 

It had been three and a half years, and Weiss only knew the good, only saw how their relationship made them brighter. Now it had all come tumbling down, crashing like a tsunami wave and leaving Weiss shaking from the seismic rifts that had torn through her roommate, her friend. She couldn’t understand what had transpired. She had no idea what to do.

 

Caretaking wasn’t Weiss’ specialty.

 

Under the cooling spring night air, Weiss approaches the group, offers them all a tight-lipped smile, refuses the blunt they offer out to her for the sake of remaining some amount sober to wrangle Yang home. The skin of Yang’s arm is sticky; half-formed sweat released from her pores—probably her body’s attempt of draining out the toxins. “Come on,” Weiss whispers, trying to rouse a half-asleep Yang, wondering if she needed to take her to a hospital for alcohol poisoning or if these effects were simply the culmination of tequila shots, weed, and a sadness that had been building for so much longer than a month, a sadness so visceral, so embedded that Weiss wonders if Yang was born with it buried in her bones, tucked away in her tendons.

 

“Blake?” Yang says back, eyes still closed even as she looks to Weiss. “Did you come back?” her voice breaks, cracks in two. It gapes wider than the split of continents, oceans and mountains and volcanoes rising up.

 

There is no way to tell her no. Impossibly to cruel to say yes.

 

Weiss sighs, placing one of Yang’s arms around her shoulders, taking the weight as she lifts her friend. “Not Blake,” Weiss answers. “Just me.”

 

Yang’s eyes open, wide and unfocused. She looks at Weiss, catalogs whatever details she can. “Definitely not Blake.”

 

They walk the whole way home just like that. Yang’s asleep before Weiss has even fully lowered her body into bed.

 

\--

 

_24_

 

“You decimated him!” Ruby shouts the moment recess is declared, her fist pumping in the air.

 

“Shh,” Weiss says harshly, digging her elbow into Ruby’s side. “Hold yourself together.”

 

The interaction makes Blake smile with a familiarity as Ruby throws her arms around Yang’s neck a second later, giggling and Weiss continues to shake her head but softens just so, wraps Yang in a hug of her own as soon as Ruby has removed herself.

 

Yang turns, finds Blake watching them, and tosses her a smile, holds out her hand in invitation. Blake’s parents are in a conversation of their own and Sun flashes her a thumbs up and waves his hand on to urge her in their direction.

 

The moment she’s entered the outskirts of the group, Ruby encircles Blake with the same vigor, the same eagerness and acceptance that she had shown Yang. “You’ll do great too, Blake!” Her embrace is tight, squeezing them close as she releases a grunt of exertion.

 

It’s impossible not to laugh, not to move her arms to return the hug and holding Ruby to her. Her honorary little sister, another loss that Blake had thrown onto the pile and accepted as her reality. “Thanks, Ruby.”

 

Weiss is more reserved, placing a hand on Blake’s shoulder. “I think your wardrobe choice was wise,” she says, shooting eyes in Yang’s direction.

 

“Wh-Two seconds ago we were celebrating me!” Yang says loudly, hands thrown in the air in exasperation. “Can’t fucking win around here.”

 

“I can’t believe you made a pun!” Ruby says next, turning to smack Yang’s arm.

 

“Seriously,” Weiss seconds with an air of importance to her voice. “Of all times for humor I hardly think now was-”

 

“No one sets up a pun that perfectly and expects Yang to just let it go,” Blake chimes in, interjecting herself as apart of the group, the same dynamic they had lived with for years. “It’s not physically possible.”

 

Yang throws her right arm around Blake’s shoulders. “Thank you, Blake. At least someone around here understands me.”

 

The look that passes between them says it all. _I know you. I always have. I always will._ Distance makes no difference. Time only changes so much.

 

There has been so much to miss since the night Blake had shoved a handful of clothes in a suitcase and taken a taxi away from everyone she loved, everyone she needed. Yang had said that there were pieces she missed that she hadn’t even thought of. Blake knew from the beginning what leaving would mean. It’s why it took a blade severing through bone, why it took seeing how much more she still had to be taken from her for her to decide to renounce the things, the people, who made her life what it was.

 

Before that point, the thought of leaving her friends, her parents, her apartment, Yang—it wasn’t a possibility. The sacrifice was too great, too demanding.

 

But then Adam is there, and he demands sacrifices, controls her offerings. In the end, Blake decided she would prefer submitting to the surrender then to watch each piece be withdrawn, extracted, destroyed.

 

“Lunch?” Ruby asks, eyes jumping between them and their shared stance. The word pulls Blake back to where she is now, the opportunity she has to reclaim the aspects of her life she’s abandoned. She was tired of her existence being a constant struggle to get back to where she had been before, of fighting uphill day after day to get return to the person she’s been, who she wants to be.

 

Yang raises an eyebrow in Blake’s direction, allows for her to answer the question. “Soggy tuna day three, here I come,” Blake answers. Yang’s arms hangs loosely around Blake’s shoulders as they walk from the main courtroom together and even though Blake knows she has a lot of fighting left to do, a lot of ground to still recover, she wasn’t battling this on her own.

 

Yang’s arm remains in place until they sit to eat, and then she hits her foot against Blake’s beneath the table, physically present, tangibly there. Almost there, Blake thinks to herself. Almost home.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> How'd we get so close to the end already? It's been a journey but I really hope so far it's been worth it. As always, thank you to everyone still reading and for all of your comments and kudos and such. Have a great weekend!


	12. Chapter 12

_24_

 

The stand is much the same as the last time Blake had been here. She holds onto her questioning yesterday—placing her trust in Ironwood to drive the questions where she needed them to go, trusting Yang to listen the whole way through.

 

Trusting herself to push through, to answer the questions without stuttering off, fading out.

 

Now Blake looks down at Corsac. There’s a weak attempt at resistance to avoid looking at Adam. She loses. Her skin crawls, goosebumps working their way up her arms, hair raising as he holds her in a stare.

 

Admitting the truth had been Yang’s problem from the beginning; it was what had limited them both, maybe even what played into their ultimate downfall in the first place. Blake has no problem with telling the truth. Her issue rested in perception, in how she assigned the guilt, accepted the errors as hers when she owned no such mistakes.

 

“Ms. Belladonna.” He smiles at her, but the kindness is lacking, even as he attempts to present it. “I’m sure this must be difficult. Two past relationships against each other in a courtroom, two different people you’ve loved fighting, and now you’re in between.”

 

“That’s not the difficult part,” Blake answers. She can’t keep her eyes from going to Adam, mask removed, eyes that were so often covered on display now. The same marker that had guilted her over and over once again flashing in her face. “I know what side I stand on.”

 

“But, Blake,” Corsac asks to approach, and Blake shoots the judge a look, a silent plea. The request is denied. “My client has sat here and stated his regret over and over, has made it clear as day that all he wanted was for you to be safe. He didn’t want you to be the victim of manipulation, to let yourself be convinced you deserved less simply because of your race.”

 

“Adam is a master manipulator,” Blake says. “I spent years of my life falling for it. He was older than me, and he knew how to groom me, so I became what he wanted.”

 

Corsac puts on a face of shock, hurt. “My client expresses nothing but affection for you, Ms. Belladonna. He has displayed his sorrow over what happened, regret over the split-second choice he made. You can’t tell me you’re really going to sit there and cast him as a villain. As your friend reminded us, there may be fault that can be applied, sure, but it does not eliminate the fact that my client has been a victim.” He turns to the jury. “He has made mistakes just like any of us, but he was also the victim of loss and abuse, his thoughts had been twisted around.”  


“He was an _adult,_ ” Blake growls. “A nineteen-year-old man approached a thirteen-year-old girl and told her that she was smart and special. He did everything to get into my head, and as soon as he was there, he planted messages about how I couldn’t trust my friends, shouldn’t talk to my parents.”

 

“Objection, Your Honor.” Corsac interrupts her impassioned speech before she can go any further, recognizing that she was spinning it around this time, that she wasn’t letting him twist the narrative that she’s lived through. “Irrelevant information.”

 

“Overruled.”

 

Corsac pales. Adam squirms in his seat.

 

The expression on her parent’s faces is that same guilt they had carried since she’d returned home at eighteen years old, offering only the basics of what had really happened. They knew, though. As soon as she was home, they allowed themselves to see the truth they had otherwise put so much effort into denying, the same one Blake tried so hard to hide.

 

“I loved a mirage,” Blake implores the jury to understand. “Far away, there was a list of promises of what he was, what he would be to me. Up close, it was different. But things were twisted and confusing, and I was a child who didn’t know any better. And now everything looks a little different to me. Sometimes it takes me three extra steps to see a situation how everyone else sees it.”

 

She draws in a breath, steadying herself, finding her ground, eyes darting between Adam and the jury, panic shifting in. In an attempt to root herself to the moment, Blake finds Yang. Forget everyone else. “That’s the past, though,” Blake says, keeps on talking even as Corsac begins to speak over her, starts to ask some other question. She holds the volume of her voice and pushes on. “Here’s what I know from the night that has left us all stuck in this room for two weeks now. I know we were being hunted. There were threatening messages in our voicemails. He was turning up on our college campus. He followed me from Menagerie, stalked me.

 

“And I know that what happened to us that night, no matter how many times we tried to contact the police, no matter if we made sure other people were with us at all times, no matter who swung first—we did not deserve what happened to us.”

 

Yang’s eyes are wide, weak, begging. She’s scared, just like she was before. She wears it openly, let’s Blake identify it, comprehend that she is not alone. “You don’t get to twist my thinking into blaming myself. Adam cornered us in a room. Adam pulled a sword on us. Adam stabbed me in my side and _cut off_ Yang’s right arm. I refuse to accept responsibility for someone else’s actions.”

 

Blake glares down at Adam. He has been small this whole time. Interpretation has proven Adam to be towering, strong, uncontestable. Blake was done allowing her perception fool her any longer. “It’s about time you stopped trying to make me.”

 

\--

 

_22_

 

In time, the transition becomes easier. Blake can face the fact that Vacuo is where she lives, where she works. She has a routine, something to get out of bed for and pursue.

 

The landscape never really wins her over, but it starts to grow on her. Like a cactus in the desert dirt—never nurtured or watered or wanted—it sprouts up regardless.

 

The hot, dry air becomes familiar, a guaranteed embrace to wrap around her as soon as she walks out the door. There’s dust that blows with the wind and even tumbleweeds that scramble across the street, sticking beneath the front of her car. Over time, the rocks become the usual landscape; the caverns and canyons grow familiar.

 

She adjusts as the months roll by, but the things she left never slip her mind, never trickle away like water through her grasp even as she hopes to open her hands and let them all run free, disappear and absorb into the ground beneath her.

 

There’s nature all around her, begging to be explored. Sun mocks her for it, rolling his eyes as she laces up her sneakers and heads for the outdoors, water bottles on the side of her backpack, notebooks and pens tucked within. She finds trails marked with small stone towers, empty, red rocks by the water side. Some have lines of color running through them, the wonders of chemistry creating a rainbow of pink and yellow and white all within the same boulder.

 

There are places to climb, and she does, sometimes with caution and sometimes without. Her agility from four and a half years of training was not maintained through active effort, but the muscle memory remains, the strength lesser but the strategy remaining firm.

 

She wears globs of sunscreen in hopes of protecting herself against the sun, still spends the first two months in Vacuo with a reddish, painful tint to her skin. The burned skin eventually peels away and leaves fresh, untainted layers. Blake makes a conscious effort to think of how this is skin Yang has never touched; she tries even harder not to let such a silly, inconsequential fact destroy her. Success hasn’t really been her theme out here.

 

There’s a spot in particular that she takes a liking too. It’s by the small river, sometimes more like a stream when the sun is persistent and burning for days on end. There’s a rock emerging from the earth with notches just big enough for her to grip onto, ridges to settle her feet within. She climbs her way to the top, muscles trembling with effort, and holds herself there in seclusion. Somedays her pen scratches the page. Others she just sits and looks out, fingers running along the rough surface beneath her, back hunching forward as she rests her elbows on her knees.

 

There was once a time when her life had been entirely composed of gentle purples, cast through with vibrant yellows. The warmth and softness found her, the light unavoidable even in her darkest shadows.

 

Now her life was overrun with constant, persistent red. Reds cake between the treads of her sneakers, on the back of her pants, deep within her nightmares. Red is the color that overtakes all else. There’s nothing to replace, nothing to wash it clean. No matter how she scrubs her shoes, the mud just rubs in further, no matter how much she tries to write her memories away, they just bury deeper.

 

The desert has water. It has life and growth and cool breezes late in the night. The desert is not desolate.

 

She writes of the ways that the desert sustains, how life remains, how you can continue to grow.

 

When she’s done, she writes about how she’s withering, how the sun has warmed her too long, how the dirt has clogged her lungs.

 

She sits on top of her rock until the sun begins to set, when the sky shifts and, for just a singular moment, the world transitions from red to a light violet overtaking the sky, a pale yellow just between. It’s a sign from home; Blake lies to herself. She holds it for all it is worth.

 

\--

 

_24_

 

Blake’s entire body is shaking when she steps down from the stands, lowers herself into her chair for the additional remarks and arguments to come. She gathers shuddering inhales, collects them in her lungs and releases singular, grounding exhales in return.

 

There’s a steady weight on her shoulder, a hand that doesn’t relent. There’s a mantra playing in the back of her mind, and she reaches for it, repeats it over and over instead of listening to any more words.

 

Dismissal comes quickly that way. Now there is a singular day to remain. Tomorrow they will return for closing arguments and then a deliberation with final results offered back. Tomorrow was when they would have to do the least. Tomorrow was the one day Blake finds she might fear the most.

 

“Heard there’s a pretty cool bar across town,” Qrow says when Yang walks towards him and her dad, Blake following blindly.

 

She looks to Blake who nods. Yes, a bar didn’t seem like a bad place to spend the hours between today and tomorrow. A bar seemed like the only option.

 

Arrangements are made, everyone talking around her, Weiss and Ruby debating the need to change, Sun wholeheartedly agreeing to join in. Ilia’s eyes falling wide when Yang extends an invitation to her as well before she fades red for a second and accepts.

 

There’s a distanced feeling to herself. Blake knows that she is here and is apart of the conversation, but she feels more as though she still remains on that stand and those questions are coming at her, like she had found her answer and pushed through. She didn’t stop even as the ground vanished beneath her and the eyes remained on her.

 

The person she does not expect to be offering an arm around her shoulders—a tenderness—is Tai Xiao Long.

 

“Hey, kiddo,” he says with a gentle squeeze. “It’s good to see you again.”

 

There’s still no anger, no bitterness, regardless of how much she might deserve it. “You too,” she echoes, smiling up at the same man who has always been by his daughter’s side when the rest of the world ran the other way, even Blake.

 

“It’d be good to see you for dinner sometime.”

 

She nods, Yang appearing at her side, just a step behind. “Yeah,” she agrees. “That’d be great.” So many places that she’s been, all over the world with her fingers tied to the keyboard, her heart tied to the one place she’d convinced herself never to return to. She’d travel far, had seen so much and lived in all sorts of places.

 

Yang throws her arms around her dad briefly before turning back to Blake, extending a hand in invitation, an offering. She had been so many places, and it might be time to come home. When Yang throws her head back and laughs at something Ruby says, Blake wonders if maybe it’s time to stick around.

 

//

 

It’s not a celebration. _“That’s for tomorrow night!”_ Ruby declares optimistically.

 

Just the four of them gather around a high top, feet dangling from barstools. Qrow gives them drinks with half strength along with cups of water and plates of food. A clear intention of keeping them functioning for tomorrow.

 

Yang keeps ordering straight liquor and Qrow brings her a half filled cup of beer and a clap on the shoulder. Bastard.

 

Weiss sips on a sprite and strums her fingers on the table, the little thumps of her fingers lost to the music. “I can’t believe you two are finally almost done with this,” Weiss says with a shake of her head. “This trial’s been hanging in the distance forever now.”

 

“You’re telling me,” Blake mumbles and Yang plucks the subtext out in an instant. It never needed to get here at all. The future was fine. “One more day.”

 

“And then what?” Ruby asks, elbows on the table around her empty bowl of mac and cheese and chin resting in her hand. “Where are you going after this?”

 

Yang reaches out a foot to kick her sister under the table but accidentally greets Weiss instead, receiving an indignant, “Hey!” and a foot back in her direction. Tomorrow was enough as it was. Yang didn’t need to face the days after that as well. Not after crying pitifully in bed beside Blake, not after begging her not to break her again, not after admitting how destroyed she had truly been.

 

Blake’s hand falls on Yang’s knee. She’d always been pretty good with subtext herself. “I have...some options with work,” Blake admits, cheeks a bright red when Yang turns to look at her. “I guess we’ll see.”

 

It’s the diplomatic answer, the one for the table. And they deserve a different answer; they deserve some hope even if it’s not real. They can live through it if it isn’t. No one could look Ruby in the eye and disappoint her. Witnessing Weiss crying might convince anyone to alter their response.

 

But Yang doesn’t do diplomatic. She doesn’t even do diplomats. She likes her truths how she likes her whiskey. “Give it to me straight,” she says when Ruby and Weiss wander away to the bathroom or to bother Qrow or whatever has sent them off. Yang didn’t care about what had finally sent them away, just that they went.

 

A few hard ciders and Blake’s a little looser. She giggles. “Isn’t that the opposite of what we are?”

 

“Blake.” Her name is enough to sober her. “I need to know. I need to know before whatever happens tomorrow happens. What if they let him off with nothing? Where are you going then?”

 

Blake’s mouth opens and shuts. She scratches a nail against the table, picking at nothing. “I don’t want to make promises right now.”

 

It’s a shot to the heart, a stabbing to the spine. The words paralyze Yang to the spot, hold her there with an endless loop of classic rock left in the background and an unevenly padded barstool beneath her. This is where she lives now; this is where she’s stuck while she deciphers such an answer.

 

It’s not a surprise. That’s the part that really makes the blade twist, really makes her notice the numbness taking over. Self-preservation was kicking in.

 

“Let me explain,” Blake rushes on. She lifts Yang’s hand into two of her own, cradles it in her embrace. Yang keeps her gaze trained on their hands, on the way Blake’s thumb smooths over Yang’s skin, how their fingers link together just right. It was something she could make sense of at least. “I have a lot of things back in Atlas, and I don’t know how long it will take me to pack it all up.”

 

“Blake Belladonna, don’t you fucking lie to me.”

 

“I’m not,” she rushes to say, body turned towards Yang’s. Their knees press together.

 

Their exhales mingles in the same space; they breathe in shared air. Yang’s eyes fall shut, and she tries to remember the world around her, her failures and losses and miseries. “I mean it. I won’t survive you leaving me again. I won’t...I can’t-”

 

Blake kisses her and Yang’s eyes open in surprise before settling shut, letting herself submit to the tenderness being offered. “I spent two years regretting every single day.” Yang grabs onto each of Blake’s arms. Not because she feels the need to hold Blake in place, but because she spent so many years trying to remember how it felt to hold her and her hands are in need of cementing the memory one more time, to grab her soft, physical flesh and bone and take hold of it. To prove that she’s really here.

 

“I meant what I said in my testimony,” Blake whispers. “I’m done taking on the guilt of someone else’s choices. I can’t carry it anymore.” She hangs her head like a hard worn soldier surrendering to the war. I have fought too long, she says. I am tired. “Not Adam’s. Not my parent’s. And...not yours either, Yang.”

 

“Finally,” Yang whispers with the fingers of her right arm tightening, holding. “Jesus, Blake.” They have to stop doing this in bars. Yang was ready to drag her in the back, show her what it means to put down her stressors, to let someone take care of her. Prove that Yang was here to take some of the weight and that she had been ready this whole damn time. Just how Blake has always carried the weight on Yang’s back, has eased her load, made her forget the demands and the fears and the pressures.

 

The monsters don’t stand a chance against us. The monsters will run in fear of what we will become together.

 

“If Adam walks free tomorrow,” Blake sighs, the possibility a haunting truth from the beginning of it all. The dismissal of their pasts is still fresh in their minds, the consequences they were forced to face because of it. “I won’t let him keep making me run. I promise. Even if he comes after us again. And if he does I’ll-”

 

“We’ll fucking murder him,” Yang finishes the sentences before Blake can lose herself to solitary solutions.

 

The smile is short-lived, but it’s there. “You know, Xiao Long, I always have been a fan of your backup plans.”

 

“Don’t make me rely on them any longer,” she whispers, letting her lips linger just by Blake’s, just by the warmth, the only future Yang has ever wanted. “Let me have my first choice, Blake.” No more fall backs, no more good enoughs. “Let me choose you.”

 

Blake sighs like a surrender, lets her forehead drop to Yang’s shoulder like an acquiescence. “You have me.”

 

“Wrong,” Yang corrects without a second to let the words filter. “I _choose_ you. You own you.” It’s an important distinction after what she’s faced, what they’ve tackled both together and apart. “We have each other. We’re still us.”

 

Blake cries with her forehead pressed into Yang’s shoulder with Queen playing in the background and a round of half-finished drinks covering the table. She cries, and Yang can’t quite identify if it is loss or sadness or worry that drives it forward. After a few minutes, she pulls back and looks Yang in the eyes, speaking the words so that it all clicks right into place. “We get to be us close up.”

 

It was relief.

 

\--

 

_18_

 

Blake’s nineteenth birthday falls on a Tuesday in the middle of January, just after returning from Christmas break. The cold has grown to be unrelenting, fresh snowfall arriving every other day. Blake is insistent, “Please, nothing big. It’s a Tuesday night for fuck’s sake.”

 

Yang had a thing for birthdays. They’re halfway through the first week of their second semester, syllabus week just about behind them. Yang walks with only a thin jacket, arms splayed as she insists, “Tuesdays are just as important as other days, Blake,” a cute smile on her face.

 

“Nothing big,” Blake says with a pointed finger. “Please,” she requests with a growing dread that Yang isn’t going to listen.

 

Tuesday rolls around, and Blake wakes up in Yang’s bed. Her head is cradled against Yang’s chest, alarm ringing from the windowsill where her scroll sat. Yang stares at her with bleary eyes when Blake is on her way out the door for class. She promises they’ll celebrate tonight.

 

Blake rolls her eyes. She didn’t want to celebrate, not really. Yang never half-assed birthdays, making full on weekend things for Ruby, turning Blake’s into a whole event. When they were kids, it was sweet. She’d woken up to balloons tied to the tree outside her window or walked into school to cards taped to the outside of her locker. Those days were past them now. They’d had enough birthdays apart that Blake didn’t need to revert to old habits, to be reminded of what birthdays used to mean in place with what they had become in her teen years.

 

Yeah, she could do without a celebration.

 

The day passes without event, classes as usual, her lunch break nothing more special than Yang delivering a chocolate cupcake in front of her with a cheesy smile and a shrug.

 

She goes back to Yang’s dorm that night, flinching against what she’ll find there. The balloons and gifts and probably more people than she cared to deal with and more alcohol than she wanted to drink in the middle of the week.

 

When Blake swings open the door, knocking has become an obsolete concept at this point, she finds Yang on her bed, feet kicking in the air, textbook open in front of her. “Hey,” Yang says without looking up.

 

“Hey…”Blake says hesitantly, resisting the urge to look under the bed. “How was your day?”

 

“Uneventful,” Yang says with a sigh, flopping over onto her back and smiling up at Blake. “And yours? Finding sweet validation in turning nineteen yet?”

 

“Um,” Blake scans the room, checks behind her before shutting the door. “Okay, where is it?”

 

“Where’s what?” Yang sits up, feet hanging from the bed, hair falling messily to one side.

 

“The hats and music and confetti shooters that twenty people I hardly know are setting off at me?” Blake demands. She drops her book bag to the floor and lets the books thunk heavily against it. “Where’s the alcohol? Hell, where’s the weed?”

 

Yang’s head cocks to the side before she goes to stand, taking a singular step in trepidation towards Blake. “You said you didn’t want anything.” Yang’s eyes grow wide. “Were you fucking with me? Shit, wait here.” She’s shoving her feet into shoes and moving to swing the door open and rush out when Blake grabs her wrist. “Seriously, like ten minutes and I can rectify this. Why the hell did I think you were serious?”

 

“Yang, stop,” Blake says, moving her body in front of the door. “I don’t want to do anything special for my birthday this year.”

 

Yang takes a step back, brushing sections of her hair back with a heavy breath. “I’m so fucking confused, Belladonna.”

 

It’s not the dumbest reason she’s cried in the last few months, but Blake blinks back tears and collects herself with a sharp inhale. “You love the whole birthday bullshit.”

 

With a nod of her head, Yang kicks her half-on shoes off of her feet. “Yeah, so?”

 

“I thought...I just assumed you’d kinda disregard me saying I wanted to be chill this year.”

 

“But that’s what you want, right?” Yang asks. “‘Cause I felt quite sure you meant what you were saying until you walked in here looking for noisemakers and hard drugs.”

 

“Weed is not hard drugs,” Blake says with a roll of her eyes. She makes fun of Yang to ignore the lump in her throat. “I just thought…”

 

Yang puts the pieces together even when the picture remains mostly blank. “You thought I wasn’t going to listen to you.”

 

“Yeah,” Blake says quietly, hating that now is the moment that this day is catching up with her. That birthdays were one more thing he took for himself, tainted against her. “You have such a love of birthdays…”

 

“I love you more, though,” Yang says automatically, expression softening, hand falling on Blake’s shoulder. It’d be so easy for her to ask if Blake is okay, but she doesn’t bother. There was no need when Blake was turning within herself in shame and frustration that she was seven months free and still fell down the same rabbit holes, stumbled over the same roots. “Blake...what you want is more important to me than anything else.”

 

“Okay,” Blake whispers, voice stolen away by the emotion stirring within her.

 

Warm arms wrap around her, never restricting, only soft and welcoming. “I was thinking we could go out for sushi, or bring it back here if you want.” Her words are a gentle breath on the side of Blake’s neck, the fingers of Yang’s left hand running along Blake’s back, the swell of her chest pushing against Blake’s, drawing them just so closer together. “But we can just hit the dining hall if you’d rather.”

 

“Yang.” Her name breaks on its way out, splintering and shuddering as it slips past. _I’m still afraid,_ Blake thinks, _I don’t know if I’ll ever be released from my past, if the shackles will ever fall loose._ “I really don’t like my birthday.”

 

Yang tenses in Blake’s arm for just a second before pulling away, hands falling to Blake’s shoulders, lips quirking in a sad smile. “I’ve always been more inclined to February birthdays,” Yang says. “We could push yours back, if you want. Celebrate a different day?”

 

It’s a solution that shouldn’t count for anything, but Blake nods through a sob.

 

Exactly a month later, on a Thursday evening, they bundle into coats and drink themselves silly on the front lawn of Nora’s sorority house, bonfire blazing and smoke filling the cold air that ice crystals practically hung within.

 

“Happy birthday,” Yang winds her arms around Blake’s waist from behind, chin falling against her shoulder, lips whispering just by her ear.

 

“Thank you,” Blake answers back, smiling against Yang’s lips pressed into her cheek. It’s not a real solution; somehow, it works anyway.

 

\--

 

_24_

 

They end up on the couch, Yang stretched out, and Blake folded up against her. No one bothers turning on the television. They accept the silence between them for what it is. Comfort, freely given. Love, openly offered.

 

At some point, after an acceptable point of going back to Sun’s has come and gone, the front door opens and Ruby and Weiss spill through.

 

“Blake!” Ruby cheers with her arms in the air the second she sees her there.

 

Without hesitation, Ruby rushes over, throwing her bag on the floor and then herself staring up at them with wide eyes. “You too, Weiss!” she instructs, and Weiss offers only a momentary hesitation before knocking Yang’s legs off a cushion on the couch and sitting there, propping her feet up on the coffee table.

 

“Rude,” Yang says, promptly placing her legs right back into Weiss’ lap and reclaiming her space.

 

“What are you guys doing?” Ruby asks, giggling as the ends of Yang’s hair sweep across her face. She bats the strands out of her way and sits up. “Have you just been laying here since leaving Qrow’s?”

 

“Pretty much,” Blake answers, omitting details.

 

Yang’s face is buried in her hair, arms looped around her waist. Her heart beats a little faster tonight, slows for a moment, and then the pace picks up again, gallops for a little longer. “Don’t feel like doing much else.”

 

Weiss sighs, hand reaching out and patting Blake’s arm. “I cant’ blame you guys. Tomorrow is…”

 

Ruby gets up, wanders off without a word. “No,” she says as she fumbles through her bag and messes with her scroll. “We are together for the first time in two years, and we’ve all been sad for long enough. I’m sick of being sad.”

 

“Ruby…”

 

Yang starts in the same moment Blake says, “I second that,” and raises a finger into the air.

 

“Good,” Ruby says before music starts pouring through the speakers, turning the volume up so it spread all through the apartment, probably bled into the ones next door as well. “No more sad!” She starts dancing, shoulders shimmying and arms going wild in uncoordinated movements.

 

Blake and Yang look to each other, exchanging smiles before Blake pushes herself up, moving her head with the beat. Yang pops up a second later, fully committing to a dance in a single second of transition. She’s a blur of movement, a rush of bright yellow hair and hips shaking the light purple pajama shorts on her bottom.

 

In a second Ruby and Yang are dancing together, wild movements, grabbing each other’s hands and swinging each other around.

 

“Is this _choreographed?_ ” Weiss asks in disbelief from where she sits on the couch.

 

“Just the chorus!” Ruby squeals as the beat picks up, her and Yang moving in impressive synchronicity after all these years.

 

“And the first three verses,” Blake laughs. She could probably remember most of their ridiculous moves herself if she tried hard enough, (she probably didn’t need to try that hard at all). “Don’t think you’re getting out of this.” Blake grabs Weiss’ hand and drags her past the coffee table, holds her hands and forces her to dance.

 

It’s wild, full-bodied movements and loud laughter and nothing but pure fun. Blake’s hands twist around Yang’s, allowing her to dip her towards the ground, a kiss being pressed to her cheek, a shared smile and bright eyes looking back at her. Ruby jumps onto the couch and shouts the lyrics down at them, feet bouncing on the cushions.

 

To everyone’s surprise, Weiss jumps up alongside her, giggling and light as she holds Ruby’s hands to steady herself, whipping her head around and letting her hair fly all about her.

 

It’s two in the morning the night before what could be a chance at freedom and victory and finally, finally safety. Or it could be the night before an eternal nightmare moving further forward.

 

Regardless, they let tomorrow be tomorrow. Tonight, the four of them dance and laugh and are together. Freedom, victory, and safety have a few different meanings. Blake finds it between the beats of a song and hands that swing her around and words sung out of harmony. Blake finds it in the exact space it has always been.

 

\--

 

_18_

 

The summer between freshman and sophomore year is magic personified. There’s not a day they spend apart. Blake situates herself on the back of Yang’s motorcycle, arms around her waist, ends of her hair blowing in the hot air as the scent of salt water fills her senses until she can taste it on the back of her tongue, feel it sinking back within her skin.

 

Ruby drags them to a theme park, Yang going on all the gargantuan coasters with her, sitting in the shade part way through the day, gold trimmed aviator glasses on, and a smoothie passed between them. Blake closes her eyes, head resting on Yang’s shoulder, exhausted from the heat and the walking and the crowds of people. It was so easy to be lured into comfort with Yang by her side, even if they were surrounded by screaming children and fanny packs.

 

Some days it’s too hot to consider going outdoors, and Blake reads her books in her bed, her head in Yang’s lap or they lounge on the couch and play games with Ruby, sitting close enough that their hips are pressed together, shoulders bumping with each movement.

 

Every single day, no matter how grand or minuscule, is the best day Blake can remember having. Yang is there, that’s about the only requirement she has these days. They share a bed, clothes, secrets and truths, and sometimes Blake feels like they even share a heart, as if hers won’t beat right unless it’s next to Yang’s.

 

Happiness has never come in such abundance. Even when they were kids, huddled on the couch watching movies or racing in the backyard, it wasn’t as wonderful as this.

 

“I love you,” she whispers at night, after Yang has fallen asleep, trying out the words that they’ve proclaimed to one another so many times but now mean something different. Words she’s offered someone before that left her so twisted and broken. Words that felt life changing even though the change in her life had already taken place, the full eclipse had come and gone and left her surrounded in so much more light than she even knew possible.

 

“You know,” Yang says, her breath warm on the back of Blake’s neck, her arm tightening slightly around Blake, “one day you can say that to my face.”

 

Blake swallows, muscles locking up until she releases each one, turning to face Yang. “I thought you were asleep.”

 

Yang smiles; it takes up her whole face, eyes crinkling, nose scrunching up, teeth showing. “And last night and the night before that and the night before-”

 

Blake pushes her, a hefty shove against her shoulder to cut her off. Yang squeals, grabbing onto Blake’s still extended hand to pull herself back before she can fall to the floor. “This bed is _not_ even big enough for us to sleep in. Don’t think about pushing me off.”

 

With a shrug Blake puts her hand down, feigning being deep in thought before dancing her fingers along Yang’s sides, up across ribs, low on her stomach, all of her most ticklish places. She screeches, batting Blake’s hands away, squirming against her grip, throwing around well-crafted expletives through her laughter.

 

“Stop!” she gasps, grabbing Blake’s hands in her own, holding them against the mattress, swinging a leg over Blake’s waist until she’s straddling her. “You’re evil, Belladonna.”

 

“Me?” Blake asks incredulously, leaving her arms limp in Yang’s grasp, knowing if she pulled away, Yang would give in an instant. “You’re the one who’s just been laying there every night acting like you’re asleep!”

 

In the darkness, Yang winks down at her, leaning over and placing a chaste kiss to her lips. “Only way I was ever going to get those words out of you, baby.” She kisses Blake’s nose, her cheeks, her jawline. “Damn, I’m missing our dorm room right about now.” She falls to the side, releasing Blake’s wrists and staring up at the ceiling. “Oh, and I love you too.” She adds it like an afterthought, like it was already known, maybe it was. “But if you tickle me like that again I am going to spend the next twenty minutes making very loud sex noises until you and your parents can never look each other in the eye again. Got it?”

 

\--

 

_24_

 

For two years Blake has been dreading the commencement of this entire trial. The day Adam was arrested, and she agreed to press charges, she knew exactly where they would end up and what she would have to do. She hated the knowledge of what the future was going to hold, what inevitability she would eventually face.

 

It turns out, the beginning wasn’t the worst part at all. Even worse is that they are now at the end.

 

She hates kissing Yang goodbye in the early morning light and slipping out onto the streets, winding through them with a cold wind stinging against her cheeks. She hates knocking on Sun’s door until he lets her in with an eyebrow raised. She hates pulling out one last outfit, slipping on those heels one last time. It’s when she’s outside the courthouse a couple of hours later that Blake decides she’s going to donate every article of clothing that has entered this building. She didn’t need any reminders.

 

“Think we can just stand out here until it’s over?” Yang asks, appearing at Blake’s side and standing close enough that their shoulders brush against one another.

 

The breeze picks up, swirls up their hair and cuts right through the meager cotton fabric of Blake’s coat. “I don’t know which would be worse,” she mumbles unhappily. Yang loops an arm around her shoulders, and it’s a rush of familiarity and safety. A lot of roads are long and hard, but this one will be worth it—the destination will be worth every treacherous mile.

 

“I do.”

 

Blake places a kiss on Yang’s cheek, lets her lips hover for just a second. Maybe the miles ahead could be good too.

 

//

 

The room is crowded but silent as proceedings begin, an immediate hush falling over the crowd as they rise for the judge, the shuffling of feet and coats and chairs creaking beneath when everyone sits again.

 

Ironwood starts, going before the people with concise information and relaying the facts that have been presented over and over. The jury nods, they take notes, some chew the ends of pen caps or fingernails. Yang can sense the lack of surety in them. It does nothing to ease her mind.

 

During the shift from Ironwood to Corsac, Adam turns in his seat, finds Yang who had already been looking at him, glaring maybe. She meets his stare and doesn’t back down. She does not shake or tremble or wither. She’s scared—of the result, of what it could mean for the both of them—but his power on her has dwindled these last few days, the fear he strikes into her has lessened since the night she lost her arm and her heart in one fell swoop.

 

_I was scared_ ; she had declared for everyone to hear. _I have become a victim_.

 

I will not let you take anything more from me, Yang tells him now, back straight and breaths even. You hold no more power over me. She reaches out, covers the distance to take Blake’s hand and does not let go. This was ending today, one way or another.

 

Adam didn’t get to decide what happened anymore. Not for either of them.

 

Eventually, he’s the one who gives in and looks away, and Yang lets her eyes close, her breath a heavy exhale as her body went slack with relief.

 

Ironwood slips between them and Blake gives Yang’s hand one final squeeze before dropping it. Yang’s hand shakes as she lets it fall back to her side, still scared and uncertain. There’s no doubt that when the gavel rings out one final time, Blake’s hand will be back within hers. Her heart steadies, her hand trembles with worry and anticipation and trust. She clasps metal of over flesh and forgets about weakness, let’s go of vulnerability.

 

There’s a future just outside these doors. With Blake at her side, there’s nothing that will hold them back from the promises contained there. The fear isn’t gone—it hovers around them, through them, in them. The fear isn’t going to vanish, but that does not mean they won’t face it. It doesn’t mean Yang has ever stopped believing they can conquer it.

 

There’s something to be said about what if’s, about the way they wait to be unpacked, opened up and aired out in the cold light of truth and potential and possibilities. There are a hundred different ways this could turn sour, a million directions that could be taken, a billion shards Yang has still yet to shatter to.

 

But there’s only two different rulings they will wait on.

 

There’s only one outcome despite the variables—it’s the one that matters, Yang thinks when she leans back in her seat and catches Blake’s hair sweeping the edge of the back of her chair before twisting around, smiling in Yang’s direction. It’s not sad or small or unsure. She smiles like she means it, like she agrees.

 

They’re afraid, but they’re together. That’s the part that matters; that’s the piece they’ll hold onto.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm not really sure how we've gotten to the next to last chapter already, but here we are. As always, I am just so, so grateful to everyone who is reading and for taking the time to comment and kudos along the way. I hope this story has been a journey worth taking and that the angst was worth persevering to this point. Last chapter still has a lot of edits to go through, but I'll be working on it! Thank you all again!


	13. Chapter 13

_24_

 

Closing arguments are circles being drawn, overlapping with the same information that has been offered before, lines crossing and twisting.

 

Torchwick presents more arguments, offers up more reasons to pity Adam, more explanations as to how he simply _should not_ be held responsible. How guilt cannot be assigned, should not be attached.

 

Ironwood goes up one final time, offers a rebuttal that’s poignant and succinct. Then, just like that, it’s over. The jury is lead away to a room to deliberate, leaving the rest of the courtroom there. “What now?” Yang asks in a whisper to Ironwood, unsure if they were allowed to talk or move or breathe. Her head spins around, finds Ruby who smiles and waves.

 

“We wait,” he says simply as dismissal proceedings begin. “Follow me.”

 

They do, back to the room they had been lead to after Blake’s first disastrous questioning against Torchwick. “What are we doing?” Yang asks, arms crossing over her chest as she drawls out her words, practiced nonchalance coming into play.

 

“Preparing,” Ironwood says, sitting in the same seat, folding his hands in front of him on the table.

 

“Wh-” Blake starts, coming around to stand in front of him. “We’re _done._ ” She wasn’t arguing. There was no going back, nothing left to review or rehash or drag her through yet again.

 

“That depends,” he says evenly. “The jury can request more information, more questionings. Although you both did well, neither side had a completely definitive case to offer.”

 

Yang shakes her head. “Why didn’t you tell us this?”

 

“I did,” he deadpans. “First day, during the overview of what to expect.”

 

“Oh,” Blake says at the same time, Yang goes, “Huh.”

 

They sit. It was only noon. Deliberations could take the rest of the day, even several to come. And if a unanimous decision could not be reached, they would be back in that room once again. So much for an ending finally realized.

 

“Do you think they will?” Yang asks, eyes on the wall across from her instead of Ironwood or Blake. “Want to know more?”

 

Ironwood sighs. “It’s hard to tell. Criminal cases end with further questioning from the jury more frequently than civil and Blake certainly opened up a can of worms with bringing up the ramifications of her past relationship with Adam during her final questioning-”

 

“Sorry,” she throws in quickly.

 

“No, don’t be,” Ironwood corrects her before Yang gets a word out, though she’s ready to argue. “It’s a solid argument to include, especially since the judge allotted it, but it’s bound to bring up some questions, especially for anyone who had been on Adam’s side to begin with.”

 

“Aw,” Yang says with a dramatic flourish. She throws an arm around Blake’s shoulders, lets her take some of her weight. “I think he might like us after all.”

 

An eyebrow is raised in their direction as he shakes his head. “This is the last favor I’m doing for Ms. Schnee. Future overseer of the company or not.”

 

“It’s because nothing could ever surpass this opportunity, right?”

 

Blake rolls her eyes at Yang and her cheeky smile and how quickly she’s fallen into ease, how her energy seems endless when Blake would give anything to curl into the corner and give up right about now. She was done with seeing him, hearing him—over the tricks it plays on her mind, how the scars on display send her back to when they had been received.

 

“C’mon Blake, back me up.” Yang cuts her way through, washes away the memories teeming at the edges, attempting to fight their way back in. “I was totally the favorite of our teachers, right? They loved me.”

It’s nothing, really, but it’s something. Blake takes it, the statement enough for her to raise her eyebrows and laugh in Yang’s direction. “These are blatant lies,” she says almost reflexively. “I’m pretty sure they drew straws every year on who got stuck with her.”

 

Ironwood actually chuckles. “I’d believe it.”

 

“Star pupil,” Yang offers as an argument.

 

“You corrected the teachers,” Blake reminds her. “No one likes that student.”

 

“They were wrong,” Yang says. “I was not about to let my fellow classmates believe babies were delivered by storks.”

 

“We were eight. She got lunch detention.”

 

“Blake refused to get lunch detention with me because she is a traitor.”

 

“Do you two ever focus?” Ironwood sighs, the small moment of pride offered to them promptly gone.

 

“Not intentionally,” Blake answers just because she knows it will make Yang laugh. The smile in response when she does is instantaneous.

 

Yang sits back in her chair, drapes an arm along the back of Blake’s, legs spread out in front of her. “Alright, I’m halfway to pro but go ahead and tell me how to play on people’s heartstrings some more.”

 

“Ms. Xiao Long-”

 

“Rule number one is to stop being so damn cocky,” Blake interrupts, more than happy to submit to the teasing banter and easy chatter to forget the worry that had settled in the pit of her stomach, the anxiety that coursed through her nerve endings. “Not your strong suit, I know.”

 

“Hm,” Yang murmurs just beneath her breath, moving a little closer into Blake’s space, chin resting in her palm. “I suppose you _would_  know that.”

 

Ironwood clears his throat. “I’m uncomfortable,” he says, and they can’t help but laugh, to let it fill the room for just a minute. “Seriously,” he sighs a minute later. “Last favor ever.”

 

\--

 

_18_

 

Ruby doesn’t necessarily find it weird that Yang asked her to go to dinner “just the two of them” during the start of Yang’s summer break from her first year of college. They did plenty of things “just the two of them” normally it wasn’t such a _thing._ Never before had it been declared that it was just the two of them because it defaulted that way most of the time anyway. Well, the two of them plus Blake.

 

Which is why it _is_ weird when Ruby asks, “Is Blake meeting us there or should we pick her up?” and Yang gets this expression that flashes across her face where it looks like she’s intentionally not smiling while also shifting her eyes too much and her nose twitching as she says, “No Blake, just the two of us.” And yeah, okay, _weird._

 

They make it all of five miles down the road, which admittedly takes longer than when Yang drives since Ruby doesn’t even have her license yet and “Are you sure this is legal?” doesn’t get her to convince Yang that this is indeed a bad idea. So she drives slow, and five miles takes twelve minutes, and that is as long as it takes for Yang’s scroll to ring, Blake’s picture filling up the screen.

 

“Hi, Blake!” Ruby shouts before Yang can even say hello. She only feels entirely ignored as they proceed with their conversation without recognition of her greeting. Yang is murmuring into her scroll, her tone all soft and gentle. Ruby rolls her eyes.

 

“Are you okay?” Yang whispers into the scroll, face turning towards the window, her finger dragging along the seam of her seat, fingers pinching at a loose thread. “How about pizza?” she suggests and Ruby’s already halfway pulled into a shopping center to turn around, direct the car back towards Blake. It would be dinner just the three of them, that’s how Ruby prefers it anyway.

 

Yang hangs up when they’re a minute from Blake’s, eyes shooting to the side to evaluate Ruby. Yes, Ruby was concentrated on the road, but she can feel a look like that.

 

“What?” she demands, slowing for a light as it turns yellow even if she could have made it through.

 

There was an entire life shared between them, struggles and hurts and happiness that only they would ever get in each other. Part of Ruby thinks that should mean Yang doesn’t have to tell her at all, a bigger part of her wonders how much effort Yang puts into hiding pieces of herself away. She puts them out of reach like Ruby’s still a toddler who can’t get to the cookie jar when it’s been pushed back on the counter.

 

The leather seat emits a groan as Yang shifts. “Sorry, I just-I meant for this to be the two of us.”

 

“You keep saying that,” Ruby says, eyebrows furrowing. “Since when did we care about it being just the two of us, Yang? I spent half my life growing up with you _and_ Blake.” Adding Blake was natural, normal. Leaving her out was the oddity. The time when she was gone, those years without her were hard for Ruby too. In part, because she missed Blake dearly like she’d lost a sister, but even more so it was watching Yang struggle, seeing her broken and lost and completely unsure of what to do. Watching someone break like that for five years will make you yearn for the person who helps them feel whole no matter what.

 

Having Blake back revived a part of her sister that seemed like it was long dead. Not Yang’s joy or confidence or sense of humor; she patched herself up and found those elements of who she was and wore them with pride. There was no glue, though, nothing to hold them together as they once were. It became masks and layers, and Ruby only saw glimpses of the reality.

 

“I know. I just…” Yang starts but then they’re outside of Blake’s house, and Yang’s seatbelt is unbuckled; she’s halfway up the driveway when Blake’s only taken two steps down. They exchange a hug, Yang pushing the hair back from Blake’s face when they part, saying something in a tone Ruby can practically hear, offering Blake a look Ruby could envision with her eyes closed.

 

It’s obvious. What they have between them has always been brighter than the sun, greater than the stars and all that. The world literally stops for them when they exchange a look. Ruby’s seen the halting of the sea, felt the stuttering of the earth’s rotation beneath her feet. It’s like a goddamn firework in the night sky, a cymbal crash in the silence, an embrace you can’t  break out of.

 

What’s between them has always been there, a part of Ruby has seen it, knew it even when she was six or ten or thirteen. You can’t look away from it, not when it’s slipping out between them, pouring over the edges when they lean too close, tilt too far towards more.

 

So it’s not a surprise that Yang’s got her hands on either side of Blake’s face, no shocker when their foreheads meet, when Yang sighs against Blake’s mouth, and Blake seems to inhale it with intention.

 

They were disgustingly in love, and Ruby was the unwilling witness left to watch them pressed close together. They aren’t quite there, yet still close enough that they don’t manage to pass each other by, just grab the other one on the way through, saying _here_ , _let me show you more._

 

When they get in the car, they both climb in the back. Yang’s practically plastered to Blake’s side. If the air weren’t so tight, Ruby would complain about the fact that she’s an unlicensed driver and now she is entirely alone in the front. Now’s not the right time, though. Glancing in the rear-view mirror, it’s hard to miss the way Blake is shaking, impossible to ignore how Yang’s hands clenched into fists before they relax, running their way along Blake’s arms and back and hair.

 

Something is happening that’s bigger than the two of them, yes, but something is happening between them at the same time.

 

Ruby drives to the restaurant and only hits the curb once.

 

//

 

There’s no question when Blake falls into Yang’s bed that night. No one asks her if she’s staying, her parents don’t even text her, assuming from the minute that she left the house with Yang she probably wouldn’t be returning home.

 

She has pajamas here but defaults to one of Yang’s T-shirts, settling amongst Yang’s sheets, breathing in every aspect that she can, letting the essence permeate her skin, sink within, to her blood and bones.

 

The lights switch off, and they’ve been in the darkness so many times before that now shouldn’t be any different. Except that it is, except that it’s been several months of college, of growing together and finding each other again in every way possible. It’s been almost a whole year for recovery and growth, but she’s still shaking. It’s been nearly 365 days of mending their relationship yet still Blake’s uncertain.

 

Yang lays beside her. She’s gentle tonight, not throwing herself on the bed or flopping onto her back, arm extending for Blake to curl against. Instead, Yang lowers herself beside Blake, remaining on her side, holding a look between them, even though she doesn’t see as Blake can in the dark. Even though, to Yang, Blake is nothing more than a silhouette right now.

 

Of course, she’s already recognized that Blake needs to see her even if she can’t see Blake. Of course, she’s already ensuring that she does just that, eyes jumping across the planes of Blake’s face, to her hands and her shoulders that continue to shake. A visual assessment in the dark might not make a lot of sense to most. Yang pieces it all together in an instant.

 

“I’ve got you,” she promises, and Blake can’t hold back a sob. It’s equal parts fear and relief, simultaneous joy and pain attempting to tango together in some broken harmony. “Blake, baby,” Yang whispers, hands brushing hair away from Blake’s face, running down her arm, fingertips pressing into her hip before sliding along her back. “Please don’t cry.”

 

But it’s so hard not to when she’s shaken to her core; it’s like fighting an invisible demon, never knowing where to swing but fighting back anyway. “He wasn’t supposed to come back.” Her voice is broken, a shattered semblance of what she intends and Yang’s lips twist to the side, her eyes falling shut. “It’s supposed to be _over_.”

 

“You’re safe,” Yang says, arms wrapping tighter, hands securing Blake’s body against her own. “I’m here, okay? No one can hurt you when I’m here.” Yang’s lips are on the top of Blake’s hair, her forehead, pressed against her temple. “He can’t hurt you,” she whispers, her breath blowing the few loose strands of hair tickling along Blake’s ear.

 

It’s a selfish request, but one Blake can’t hold back when there’s a pit in her stomach and flashes of memory in her mind. “Don’t leave me.”

 

A sob breaks loose from Yang’s lips, a gasp of desperation and Blake can feel the wetness from her tears dropping to her face. “I won’t,” Yang vows over and over as she continues her kisses, sloppy and wet and desperate as they land on Blake’s cheek and chin and neck before traveling back up, to the other side of her face, pressing their lips together as Yang passes by, as if the notion is inconsequential, just one more place she has no choice but to securely fit her lips against. “I’m here, Blake.”

 

They fall asleep pressed together, Yang’s lips still half buried amongst Blake’s skin.

\--

 

_20_

 

Their college apartment is always some combination of organized and chaos, which is just reality with the four of them all living there. The one bathroom is less than ideal, though Yang uses it to her advantage, dragging Blake by the tail of her shirt into the bathroom, reminding her that a shared shower is only logical with their current situation.

 

Yang cooks, Weiss cleans, Blake keeps track of the bills and the finer details, Ruby douses the place in music and laughter. Together, they joke—they become one fully functional adult.

 

The weekends are when they go out, finding a night exclusively for the two of them. Yang has her chin resting in her hand Friday morning, half-asleep eyes watching her girlfriend eating cereal, spoon in one hand and scroll in the other as she reads through the morning articles that interest her the most. “Let’s go somewhere that you can wear that purple dress again,” Yang says, the image already burned into her mind but the reinforcement desired all the same.

 

Blake lowers her scroll just enough so her eyes can meet Yang’s. “Only if you wear that gold trimmed white top again,” she answers with a shrug of her shoulders, tongue darting out to lick her lips.

 

Yang laughs, a little loud for the otherwise serene morning quality of the apartment, she fills the space with her joy, the sound waves wedging their way into every crevice and nook. “You just like the way my boobs look in that,” she accuses, stepping around the counter, fitting her hips in between Blake’s knees from where she sits on the stool, standing over her with a hint of a smile, her eyes glinting with mischief as her hair falls to the side, the ends of it brushing against Blake's bare arm.

 

Blake’s raisin bran and morning congress update are abandoned as her fingers trail along Yang’s arms, settling on her waist. “And you,” she shoots back, her forehead bumping against Yang’s stomach, the crown of her forehead hitting ribs, “simply like my ass in that purple dress.”

 

“False,” Yang whispers, leaning over, lips hovering just above Blake’s. “I like your ass in that dress, but I also love the way your eyes glow, the way it dips down your back and shows off your shoulders,” Yang presses a kiss to Blake’s neck, “the way the hem falls just halfway down your thighs, how little effort it takes to get to the core of you.” Blake shivers as Yang sucks on her pulse point, moving her lips to the back of her ear. “There are a lot of reasons I like you in that dress, Belladonna.”

 

Blake clears her throat, chest rising as she drags in a breath of air. “You win,” she whispers, convinced into forgetting all about her morning sociology class without Yang even asking her to do so.

 

And there’s that laughter again, warming the whole place, filling it with life. “I’ll accept a truce,” she says, pressing her lips to Blake’s, tongue darting along her bottom lip before pulling back. “But for the love of god, don’t insult me by suggesting I merely like _one_ part of you.”

 

She winks, stepping away as Ruby walks into the kitchen.

 

“Ew, stop,” she says, dumping lucky charms into a bowl. “It is too early in the morning for whatever is happening out here.”

 

“We’re just making dinner plans,” Yang shrugs.

 

Ruby gags. “I know exactly what that means, and I will be out very late tonight.”

 

Yang’s hand musses Rub’s already overrun bedhead, “Can’t say that’s a _bad_ idea.”

 

With a jerking of her arm, Ruby tries to push off Yang, yelping when Yang digs her knuckles harder into the crown of her head. “Cut it OUT, Yang!” She drops her spoon, ducking out of the noogy and counter attacking with flailing hands. “Living with you two is disgusting. I’d get more sleep in a fucking brothel!”

 

Blake laughs, stomach quivering as she watches the two of them, caught off guard by Ruby’s statement.

 

Weiss appears with hair half-straightened, eyes narrowing. “What the hell is going on out here?” she demands, brush in one hand as she places her hands on her hips, eyes darting from where Blake is laughing from the barstool to Ruby and Yang and their mess of limbs batting against each other in the kitchen. “For fuck’s sake. You’re all children.”

 

“Blake and Yang are being gross again!” Ruby yells as Yang wraps her in an armlock. “I’m losing my innocence, Weiss! They’re sacrificing my youth!”

 

“I don’t know which one of you I hate more,” Weiss mumbles, turning to go back to her room, the door slamming shut behind her.

 

“We love you too!” they shout in unison, laughing.

 

\--

 

_24_

 

Deliberation is over more quickly than anticipated. It could have taken days, weeks even. There could have been demands for more questions to be asked and more answers provided.

 

Instead, the jury is ready in the span of a generous lunch break.

 

The afternoon sun filters into the courtroom through the overhead windows, casting the wall across in golden hues, glinting off of Yang’s right arm. The light is bright in Blake’s peripheries.

 

There’s procedural they’re required to go through all over again. It takes precious time that doesn’t seem a luxury they can afford right now. It’s methodical with precision at its core throughout each opening act. There’s potential for it to be calming, except Blake has a jackhammer in her chest, and her blood has run cold, setting her body in a constant state of chilled.

 

Ironwood separates Blake from Yang, like always, and it’s now more than ever that Blake could use their hands pressed together, a gentle reassurance, a reminder that if the ending is not the one they’re desperately hoping for they can still go on, they will.

 

“Will the head juror please stand?” the judge asks. A chair creaks and scrapes against the floor as he stands, posture straight and even as he looks to the judge. “Has the jury reached a unanimous verdict?”

“Yes, Your Honor.”

 

Yang leans back in her seat, looks to Blake and flashes a smile that does not fall easily. It’s out of place in a room filled to the ceiling in tension, unbelonging amongst this reality of decisions and fates and safety resting in the hands of people who have no concept of what it truly means. There’s a history hanging from the window panes, a past beneath the seats, memories dancing in the shadows.

 

The clerk takes the paper extended from the head juror and passes it to the judge who reads it silently.

 

There was a future here too, pushing up through the floorboards, a potential that could no longer be ruled by the bang of a gavel, by a threat in the background.

 

The clerk is handed back the paper and faces the crowd, eyes downcast as he reads, “The jury has found the defendant guilty on all counts.”

 

There’s a fear that washes free from the room, a sickening silence that vanishes with an exhale of breath, a sigh of relief. The tears appear in a moment, a welling of emotion too great to be pushed back down; it was fighting its way out of her system in any way possible. Tears slip past as a smile takes over her face with no effort.

 

They forget procedures for just a second, reaching behind Ironwood’s back and grabbing each other’s hands, holding tight. Blake clutches with a desperation beneath her fingernails, a promise buried in her palm. _We did it._ Her free hand runs across her face, wiping away the tears. _Together, we have survived this too._

 

The judge declares the sentencing, the years in prison, how many without parole.

 

Away.

 

Gone.

 

_Free._

 

“Court is adjourned.”

 

Yang’s hands are on her before she’s even managed to get up. The second she does, Yang wraps her tight, lifts her feet from the floor, buries her face right into Blake’s neck, breathes her in. Tucked away against Yang, the dam gives way, the resistance has been lost entirely, a casualty of the war they have fought. She sobs in the relief that overflows from within her, the release of the misery that has followed her for years, the losses she’s suffered since she was thirteen years old.

 

Blake releases it all buried against Yang’s shoulder with arms wrapped tight around her. There are words she needs to say, confessions ready to burst free, but not now. Not with the world witnessing this moment between them. A fact Blake is reminded of when she looks up to find her parents just steps away, Sun and Neptune on the periphery, Tai and Qrow at the edge.

 

They open their arms and Ruby—who was closest of all—rushes forward first, an arm around each of their necks before she steps back and offers up the same opportunity for Weiss who steps in, her own tears tracing down her cheeks.

 

“I’m just...I’m so...and you’re both-”

 

“It’s okay, Weiss,” Yang laughs, sniffles as she pulls an arm free to run a hand under her eyes. “I won’t tell anyone you have feelings after all.”

 

“I love you guys!” Ruby cries with no other context, just pulling Blake tighter and openly sobbing. “I love you so much.”

 

“Calm down, Ruby,” Yang says, but there’s a tremble in her voice, and when she rolls her eyes, a tear slips down her cheek. “We all know _you_ have plenty of feelings.”

 

Blake’s parents are there next, a hand on their daughter’s back and one for Yang as well, her mom leaning in and pressing a kiss to her cheek. Sun moves to do the same, and Blake breaks out of their group hug long enough to smack him away, laughing. Ghira takes the moment to wrap his daughter up, hunching down so she could wrap her arms around his neck like a little kid. She catches Yang over his shoulder, laughing at something Tai said and accepting his hug, the way he ruffles her hair.

 

They hold each other’s stare. Now they would give everyone a minute to celebrate with them and join in their victory.

 

Later would be just for them to revel in their triumph. They had reached the summit with more than a few scrapes, a couple of bruises to get to the top. But here they stood, the world laid out before them, just for them.

 

Their eyes hold each other, and there’s the earth turning beneath their feet again, a motion set forward, a destination all their own. _You can’t decide your soulmate,_ Blake hears her eleven-year-old voice declare in the back of her head—there’s sun warming her arms and violets and daisies tangled in the gold of Yang’s hair—there’s perfect peace and joy and a silent stirring in her chest that was awakening something new, something she hadn’t yet even begun to come to terms with.

 

_I’m just calling it like I see it,_ Yang echoes back, tones of confidence warming the air around them, unbridled determination filling the shadows in with light.

 

Blake can’t wait to tell her that she was right.

 

\--

 

**_13_ **

 

“Oh, come _on,”_ Yang says with a tug of Blake’s hand. “We have like, one week before you leave. I’m not wasting it asleep.”

 

Blake groans, batting away Yang’s hand with half-hearted determination, heart squeezing at the mention of leaving, of inevitability. “I’m up. I’m up. Geez.”

 

Yang hovers over her, face arranged in amusement as she says, “What will you do without me to wake you up in the summer?”

 

It’s too early in the morning to start crying. “As if we’ll be spending the summers apart.”

 

A smile stretches across Yang’s face. “Good answer, Belladonna,” she says before giving Blake’s hand another hard tug.

 

“Where are you trying to drag me off to anyway?” Blake runs a brush through her hair as Yang bounces on the balls of her feet. For the last two weeks, they had spent very little time on sleep; the hours were being eaten up together, always in one another’s space. Yang’s urgency was radiating off of her, the impending reality of Blake’s departure dulled Blake’s energy, drained her desire to get out of bed and do anything at all. The effect was the opposite in Yang.

 

“Anywhere,” she answers. “It’s you, me, and the open road.”

 

“Of pre-approved bike trails?” she adds on with a laugh and a quirk of her eyebrows.

 

Yang seems to contemplate this, leaning against the dresser as Blake worked her hair into a braid, eyes shifting between her mirror and Yang. “Or maybe not.”

 

After the roof incident at the end of 6th grade, there had been some more rules on where Blake and Yang were allowed to go on their own. “Maybe let’s not get grounded seven days before I’m off to an entirely different island?”

 

Yang deflates then, energy flickering, shoulders rolling forward. She looks tired in the same way Blake feels. There’s a heaviness between them, on them. “No one would dare ground us,” Yang insists. “They feel too bad.”

 

Well, can’t say she’s wrong. “Alright,” Blake agrees with a shrug, pulling a T-shirt overhead. “What did you have in mind exactly?”

 

A shadow crosses over Yang’s face as she says, “Maybe just leave and not come back?” before she rolls her eyes, swats the idea away with her hand like it had been physically present in the room, like it could be dismissed so easily.

 

“Yang…” Blake starts as she has many times before now. _I don’t want to leave you._

 

“I’m kidding. Obviously.”

 

It’d be easy to pretend like it was an option. Just as when they were little kids with scabbed up knees and a half-built spaceship in the backyard. _“I don’t run away,”_ she’d said even back then. Seven years old and already tying herself down, already fastening herself to where she needed to be. _“I won’t leave._ ”

 

“I wish we could,” Blake offers, grabbing Yang’s hand and tethering their fingers together. “I wish it was that easy.”

 

It wasn’t uncommon these days for Yang to tear up. “Me too,” she whispers, eyes blinking fast. “But you’ll come back.”

 

“I’d rather not leave at all.”

 

A smile in response, a sad, half-curl of her lips as she swallows heavily. “Good answer, Belladonna.”

 

\--

 

**_24_ **

 

There are immediate orders for celebration—a dinner out that everyone is invited to, even Ironwood. They file out of the courthouse with Ruby draping an arm around each of their shoulders, chattering on. Blake’s parents follow a step behind, Sun, Neptune, and Ilia off to the side, attending dinner on Blake’s insistence.

 

“Wanna ride?” Yang offers before anyone else can pull Blake away.

 

Blake smiles at the offer, at the familiarity. “Sure,” she says, flashing her parents and Sun a smile as Ruby drops her arms, stepping beside Weiss. “See you guys there.” She follows after Yang, knowing that the ride she was offering was a mile and a half away back at their apartment. Yang’s apartment, really.

 

Without any preamble, Yang slips an arm around Blake’s shoulders, lets her hand fall and rest on Blake’s arm. “So,” Yang says, settling into an easy stroll. “I guess...I guess that’s over. It was…”

 

“Anti-climatic?” Blake supplies, smiling as Yang laughs. “I expected more...something.”

 

“I didn’t even _see_ them haul him off,” Yang adds on. “I was hoping to get one final look at him all pathetic and crazed.”

 

“I wasn’t.” The last two weeks had been more than enough time to look at him, to force herself to look away, to remember he didn’t still own her. She didn’t need to witness that flash of anger again, didn’t need to close her eyes and feel anything over the fact that she’d finally been one of the ones to lock him away besides pride.

 

Yang stops, grabs Blake by the shoulders and spins her towards her. “You good?”

 

“I don’t know,” Blake says softly, pulling them to the side, off the middle of the sidewalk and under a store’s awning. “I feel…”

 

“Yeah,” Yang agrees, but she offers a smile, her thumb running along Blake’s shoulder soothingly. “Me too.” The hesitation fades away as Yang steps forward, wraps Blake in her arms and pulls her close. Blake buries herself there, drawing in the scent of citrus and early morning fires and home. “Blake.”

 

“Yang.”

 

She pulls back, one hand coming up to cradle the side of Blake’s face, a stiff inhale drawn between them. “Do you really think we have to go to that dinner?”

 

Blake laughs, only now realizing she was crying too. “Probably?”

 

“Dammit!” Yang shouts, more exuberant than necessary, or appropriate for a late Wednesday afternoon. But then she laughs, pulls Blake against her again as they continue towards their apartment. “We could get drinks or something after. If you want.”

 

There’s a tenuous pull between them, not quite like anything they’ve known before. The surety between them had always been omnipresent, even in the most uncertain times. This is different. Blake knows healing happens in many forms, in layers.

 

“That would be good.” Thankfully, she also knows they were never broken, not really.

 

\--  

 

**_18_ **

 

“Are you...okay?” Blake asks one night. They’re in her dorm room for once, her roommate out for the night. Yang sits silently on Blake’s bed, legs spread out in front of her, textbooks on her lap, at her feet—pages saved with pencils and hair ties.

 

Normally, homework sessions like these were filled with Yang’s chatter as she reasoned through answers, inane conversation about their day, a food break a couple hours in. Today she’s quiet, end of her pencil tapping on a page, flipping between the same few sections of a chapter over and over.

 

She looks up, regards Blake, who sits at the end of the bed, back against the wall and legs crossed beneath her. She shrugs, “I’m fine,” she answers and goes back to staring at page 106 like she hasn’t been staring at it for the last thirty minutes.

 

Yang’s “I’m fine” roughly translated to never worse. Blake shuts her Period Literature book and sets it aside, crawling her way up the bed beside Yang. She takes Yang’s book out of her hands, despite her indignant, “Hey!” and closes it without a bookmark. “Blake, what are you-”

 

There’s only a moment’s hesitation before Yang raises her arm, lets Blake fit against her side. Physical closeness was something Blake requested without words, nudging her way into Yang’s space, finding hands ready to welcome her, arms that wrapped her up. “You’re not fine,” she insists, letting her eyes close and the thrum of Yang’s heart beat against her ear.

 

Yang tenses, muscles going rigid, hands going still. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

 

“Yang.” Blake pushes when she knows there are words that need to be said, confessions made. When they were kids, Yang offered her truths to Blake with no prodding, no drawing it out bit by bit. She used to relinquish her vulnerabilities without hesitation. Now there’s a difference, a cautiousness, a moment before where she seems to hold them for herself, suffer alone. “C’mon.”

 

There’s a hand on Blake’s back, running circles, drawing patterns. Blake hums against her, feels the breath Yang draws in, her chest expanding beneath Blake’s cheek. “It’s stupid.”

 

“Indulge me,” Blake whispers, tongue running along her lips, ignoring the impulse she has to press them right there against Yang’s exposed collarbone, the soft skin where her neck joins her shoulder. “If I have to spend another second reading about The Lady of Shallott I’m going to crawl out of my skin.”

 

“You love that poetry crap,” Yang answers but now her fingers are twisting in Blake’s hair, dancing on the skin exposed of her lower back. There’s so much still missing between them, cracks to fill and distances to forge back together. Sometimes these touches are the suspension bridges that tie things back together, let’s them cross into territory otherwise uncharted.

 

There’s a response that begs to be said, about loving Yang more, about wanting to fill in her margins, grasp her symbolism, her words unsaid and the context tucked into the things she does. “Maybe,” Blake says instead, knowing it’s too soon for some sentiments. “This is better, though,” she says to broach the truth. Her nose turns, breathes in Yang’s scent, holds it close. “Talk.”

 

For several minutes, there’s nothing. There are Blake’s fingers ghosting up and down the exposed skin of Yang’s forearm, there’s Yang’s cheek pressed into the top of Blake’s head, a kiss settled amongst her hair. There’s a wetness that sinks into the strands, and Blake pushes her body closer, holds Yang tighter.

 

“It’s so dumb,” she says eventually, but now there’s a quiver in her voice, a surrender in her bones.

 

Blake pulls back just enough, wipes the tears from Yang’s cheeks, offers her the smallest of smiles as she tucks hair behind Yang’s ear. She lays back down so her nose was almost pressed into Yang’s cheek, so that she can keep her eyes on her. “Tell me anyway.”

 

She cries first, trembling lower lip, fast falling tears, shaking, uneven breaths. “I hate her so much,” Yang admits in a whisper, and somehow Blake has known the whole time. Somehow, she understands as soon as Yang says those words.

 

“Your mom.”

 

“I _hate_ her.” And it’s not true, but it’s the truth Yang wants to live in, the one she wants to mean more than the reality that causes a flood to burst forth, a current not able to be fought back once someone had pried at her gates, eased them open. “And it’s my own fault. I didn’t want to talk to her; all these years, I’ve told her to stop. Stop calling. Stop emailing. Stop trying.”

 

Blake knows what it means to say the things aren’t the truth. There’s a self-preservation that doesn’t go away, a fear trembling in your spine, shaking in your ribs. “She stopped.”

 

Yang’s answering laugh is bitter, hard. “It’s been four years, and now she quits. It’s not like she was ever trying that hard, but she wasn’t supposed to just...she was supposed to keep trying. She owed me that.”

 

God, it’s the truth. After leaving, after missing an entire childhood, after everything—the least she could do is prove herself. To show she wasn’t going to take off again, wasn’t going to leave.

 

And Blake’s heart squeezes, tight and painful in her chest as she slides an arm behind Yang’s shoulders, wraps her up against her, presses her lips wherever she finds skin. Because people keep leaving; Yang is told over and over that she’s not enough. Blake had done the same, had caused that same pain. But this isn’t about her or the guilt she carries. This has nothing to do with the mistakes she’s made or the consequences they’ve had.

 

“She owes you even more, Yang,” Blake tells her, and her fingers clench in need of Yang understanding, of grasping the truth just as tightly as Blake holds onto her now.

 

“We barely talked but…” she fades off, pulls away from Blake enough to run a hand down her face, wipe the remnants of her misery off before they etched themselves too deeply. “I was just starting to respond, and then she stopped. It’s like the second she saw a piece of me she stopped wanting it.”

 

The admission hurts to say, the words and their honesty a palpable pain in the air of the tiny, closed off dorm room. “I’m sorry,” Blake says quietly because she doesn’t know what else to say, to feel. She wants to cry for Yang, her sadness embedding into Blake’s veins, inscribed on her arteries. “You deserve so much better than her.”

 

Yang shrugs, but she’s on the precipice of something more, dangling off the edge of sincerity.

 

“You do,” Blake insists and she remembers spray painted signs and forgiveness that never ran dry; she thinks of tufts of dirt and red eyes and black eyes in the second grade, of broken legs and still trying to get up. Yang never faltered in her dedication to the people she loved; her loyalty ran to depths still undiscovered.

 

“I miss my mom,” Yang says. She doesn’t talk about her often, but Blake knows who she’s referencing, knows that Raven has never earned that title.

 

“I know.” And then because there’s only so much to be said, Blake just goes for the truth, for the part she feels even though she’d never met Summer, even though the pieces she’s learned have been few and far between. “She’d be so proud of you, Yang.”

 

That’s the part that it hurts to hear, maybe, because it’s the reminder that she will never be able to witness who Yang has become because she will never have a chance to say the words herself. Maybe it’s because it’s the truth, she wouldn’t leave, not if she’d had the choice to stay.

 

“I _miss_ her,” Yang says again.

 

“I wish I could have met her.” When they were kids, Yang didn’t breathe a word of Summer. There were rare nights when they were both tucked into Blake’s bed where she’d make an offhand comment and Blake would be hit with the fact that, unlike Ruby who didn’t really know what it was like to have a mom, Yang knew and remembered and ached at the absence, but she pretended otherwise. She watched Blake and Kali interact with sad, wide eyes, flinched away from the affection Kali offered in the beginning, accepted it with caution as time went on. It was never the same, though. Blake understood that. “She would’ve liked me. Parents love me.”

 

Yang rolls her eyes. “She’d hate you as much as I do.”

 

“So, not at all?”

 

“Don’t push it.”

 

“I love you, Yang,” Blake says because there’s this sadness leaking out with the teasing, a loss that no one else can ever fill back up. “I’m sorry.” Sorry for how people leave her, how Raven has vanished again, how Blake had abandoned her, how Summer hadn’t been given a choice.

 

There’s no acknowledgment of the apology. “I love you, too,” she says instead, Blake’s body almost entirely on top of Yang’s now. “Thank you.”

 

The gratitude hasn’t been earned, but now isn’t the time for arguing. So Blake nods; she closes her eyes; she presses herself into the moment, the sensation, the relief. She says, “You’re welcome,” and “I want to give you the world.” They exist in a moment and breathe in a vacuum, just the two of them. Blake breaks them free when she says, “I bet I would have loved her too,” because Blake loves anybody who cares about Yang, appreciates anyone who demonstrates it.

 

This time, Yang doesn’t cry. She nods, agrees. “I guess we’ll never know.”

 

Blake smiles and says, “I think we do.” It’s not the same, but it counts in its own way.

 

“Yeah,” Yang says, and her hands are a little more insistent, a little more desperate. “I feel like we do.”

 

\--

 

**_24_ **

 

Dinner was exactly as expected, loud with high, frantic energy. Everyone talked loudly, Ruby frequently attempting to get a word in edgewise by raising her voice, Qrow sipping on a drink, Blake’s parents talking amicably with Tai and Weiss chatting with Sun and Neptune. Yang sits right next to Blake, hooks a foot around the leg of Blake’s chair, keeps her close to her for the entire event. They more so let the conversation take place around them then join in, just enjoying the company of all their loved ones, and the people who were so thrilled to celebrate with them, for them.

 

Yang sips on a beer, rolls her eyes at Blake’s typical hard cider, stealing bites off of her plate. They weren’t back to normal, the normal they lived in was a new one now, different than how they had existed before, but Yang wasn’t as afraid to lean back into the familiarity.

 

After two years of reorganizing her thoughts, reworking her instincts, it was a surprise to find nothing had really changed; none of her habits had truly faded. It was as easy to fall into Blake as it always had been, the effort present only when she held herself back. There’s a worry nesting in the back of her mind, a fear nuzzling its way into her chest. She’s been left before, too many times. She knows how this could end, has barely survived the last time, but she fights it back.

 

They had both made their mistakes. It was time to move forward.

 

After dinner, everyone takes turns hugging; Yang even pulls Sun in. Their few conversations had never gone beautifully, but he had been there for Blake and for that she was grateful. The only reason he reached out to Yang was out of concern for Blake because he saw what she needed. It was hard to fault him for that.

 

Blake pulls her jacket tighter around her outside. The temperature wasn’t quite as sharply brisk as it’d been a few weeks ago, but there was still an omnipresent chill that hung in the air, a breeze sweeping through the streets, stinging their cheeks.

 

“We’ll catch you later,” Yang offers to Ruby and Weiss who exchange a look between themselves before turning back and hugging Blake and Yang both, Ruby squeezing them tightly. “Okay, okay, we’re going out for drinks, not moving out of the country. Calm down.”

 

“I love you guys so much,” Ruby says with little grunts of effort as she hugs them tighter, pulled off by Weiss. “Remember me!” she calls out as she’s dragged away, a hand reaching out.

 

Yang rolls her eyes. “Always dramatic that one.”

 

Blake chuckles, letting Yang’s arm wrap around her, her head falling against Yang’s shoulder. “I’m relieved to see not too much has changed.”

 

The statement settles between them, not wedging a space to make room but existing within the cracks, the fissures that remained. “That came out wrong,” Blake says, not knowing how else to follow up.

 

“No,” Yang corrects, dropping her arm from around Blake’s shoulders and reaching for her hand, lacing their fingers together. “No, you’re right. Things changed but…” Yang laughs, shakes her head. “Ruby said something at the beginning of this all that stuck with me.” Sure, she had snapped originally, but because Ruby was right. Yang knew it before the words had even left her mouth, was frustrated someone else was throwing the truth in her face when she was beyond ready to shove it away.

 

“What’s that?” Blake prompts, leading them up the stairs of the parking garage without dropping Yang’s hand.

 

“That we’ve changed, sure, but foundationally—things are still the same.” At the time, Yang had been too lost in anger and sadness to do anything with that statement but fight it. She didn’t want to be the same, not when loving Blake was such a part of the foundation that made Yang who she is. “I was so mad at her at first.”

 

Blake’s fingers twist in Yang’s, a nervous habit. They stop in front of her bike. Blake shifts from one foot to the next. “Because you wanted a new foundation.”

 

“You cracked the hell out of my old one,” Yang tries to carry on with the analogy, but it just makes her sad. “Come on, let’s go.”

 

“Where to tonight?” Blake asks, swinging a leg over the back of the bike and wrapping her arms around Yang the second she sits down.

 

Yang shrugs, letting the bike rev to life beneath them. “Anywhere we want.” It’s late, the sun set and the stars emerging, the moon is a waning crescent tonight. Yang drives with cautious speed, not taking the turns too fast but weaving in and out of slower traffic, carrying them both away from the city. It’s quiet, it was too difficult to talk over the noise of the engine, so they ride in comfort, Blake’s arms looped around Yang’s waist, her cheek resting against Yang’s shoulder blade.

 

The scent of the salt and seaweed greet them before they see anything else to tell of their location. Yang drives right past the “Swim at your own risk signs” and “Closed dusk to dawn” and pull her bikes into a parking spot, sand crunching beneath her boot on the pavement.

 

Yang pulls a blanket out of the tank bag, along with a bottle of champagne that was sure to be more than a little shaken up by now.

 

“Isn’t it a little cold for the beach?” Blake asks, crossing her arms over her chest.

 

Yang grabs an extra blanket while she’s at it, drapes it over Blake’s shoulders. “Quit complaining, baby. Never satisfied.” They exchange a smile in the dim street lights overhead.

 

They fight against the wind to lay the blanket out on the sand, trying to keep the corners in places. Eventually, Blake just throws herself on top of it, laughing as the end whips up into her face and batting it back down.

 

Laughter bubbles out of Yang with ease as she grabs the other end of the blanket and settles onto it, no hesitation to lean forward and press a kiss to Blake’s lips. Foundations hadn’t changed in the slightest.

 

Blake sighs, laying back and staring up at the sky. There’s cloud overhead, shifting over the stars, causing them to blink in and out of existence with a blow of the wind. “This should have been us all along,” Blake admits sadly. There had been years lost between them, pieces shattered, trust crumpled beneath her footfalls as she ran.

 

“Hey,” Yang says, pushing herself up, leaning over top of Blake and flashing her a smile. “It gets to be us now, right?” she asks, fingers trailing their way across Blake’s cheekbone, down her neck, tangling in her hair. “You’re here now.”

 

“Yes,” Blake whispers. “I’m sorry I left you.” It’s an admission that has been waiting to be spoken. Not something unknown, but something Yang needed to hear. I’m sorry you were left again. I’m sorry that it was me. “I was trying to do the right thing and in the meantime I-”

 

“Fucked up?” Yang supplies, flashing a smile again, leaning into the parts of their relationship that have always been effortless.

 

Blake pushes up, sits across from Yang. She reaches out a hand and runs it along Yang’s cheek, holds it there. “I won’t leave again. Yang, I swear, I know it’s going to take so much more. I know how badly I’ve hurt you. I know-”

 

“Belladonna,” Yang interrupts the tailspin before it can get further out of hand. “I’ve heard Atlas is lovely this time of year.”

 

Blake’s eyebrows furrow, thrown off by the abrupt change in conversation. “Atlas isn’t lovely any time of year.”

 

A rush of laughter spills out of Yang as she shakes her head. “Dumbass, I’m trying to invite myself back to your place. Maybe...help you pack stuff up?” The nervousness trickles through her veins like ice, flutters in her stomach, collects in the palms of her hands. It wasn’t familiar; Yang hadn’t spent much time worrying whether or not Blake wanted her. “If you’d like.”

 

There’s a single moment of gentle shifting, Yang being pulled closer by Blake’s hand on the back of her head before they meet, lips pressed together. “I would like that.” Blake’s eyes fall shut, a rush of air falling from her lungs as her body slumps forward, forehead meeting Yang’s, reaching forward just an inch for another gentle kiss.

 

Yang watches her like that, illuminated only by the moon’s reflection off the rocking water and the shifting stars above. Dark hair trickling across her pale skin, eyelashes dusting against her cheek, breaths steady and even. Yang knows Blake is breathing her in, holding her there. Yang knows her. Two years didn’t touch what they have.

 

“I could never leave you again,” Blake whispers, just loud enough to be heard over the crashing of the waves. “I think it almost killed me.”

 

“‘Bout damn time,” Yang says softly in reply, meaning to add a laugh at the end but losing herself to the relief that floods her with the admission. Oxygen, sun, water, a heartbeat steady and sure—it’s been too long without these parts that were necessary to survive, to grow. This whole time, Blake has carried them with her, tucked beneath her arm, just between her lips, deep within her veins. Yang does not need to take it back, not when it’s offered freely, hands wide open, pouring into her.

 

She shuts her eyes, breathes Blake in, takes her own turn at recommitting the scent of her to memory, letting the aroma drift her back to seven-year-olds on the playground with dirt beneath their fingernails, thirteen years old on the carpet of Blake’s bedroom floor, half-dried toenail polish, seventeen and finding a potential once again, a hope regained. She’s nineteen, tucked beside Blake in bed, twenty-one, and there’s a whole future wide ahead of them, open for them to grasp with both hands, beside each other.

 

“I’m here,” Blake says simply, a truth to once again be acknowledged, to be clung to.

 

“You’re here,” Yang answers back, lets her breath ghost over Blake’s face, kisses her again, a hint of desperation, of a need for proof. There’d been too many dreams like this exact moment, too many promises that Yang had woken up alone and found them not to be the least bit real.

 

“It’s okay,” Blake offers, says it more like a question, in need of her own reassurance that they can get back what they have lost, what has been surrendered.

 

“It’s okay,” Yang says with clarity, making sure Blake holds her stare as she says it, ensures that she knows the truth is being spoken. “We’re okay.”

 

“We’re safe.” Blake says the last one with a sob, a fear outlived, a relief breaking through to the surface, a truth as widespread and numerous and real as the sands below them and the stars above.

 

It’s a truth Yang knows Blake once never imagined as a reality, a truth that was elusive for so long, lurking out of reach in the dark trees, the flash of cameras, in the dark tones of voicemails. “We’re safe.” She echoes the sentiment for her own sake. The fear wasn’t lost, not forgotten. The dread that had sat low in her stomach, the anxiety that came alive within her the second she heard Blake’s name uttered, the moment she knew just how much Blake was in danger, her safety threatened— _that_ was what kept her awake in nightmares at night, that terror was the one Yang struggled to break free from.

 

“I love you,” Blake admits, tone bittersweet, the words carried out with a memory and a promise all in the same breath. “Every day without you, I just…” She kisses her again now, fills the gaps that her words can’t with the press of her lips, the urgent markings of her fingers gripping and grasping.

 

“I love you,” Yang breathes back on instinct. There’s no hesitation for the sun to shine, for the stars to rain down, it was natural. As was this. The words lived on her tongue, a single breath away from _Blake_ from _Belladonna_ from _come back to me_ . The words have never left, never faded; they have waited to be heard far more than they have ever needed to be said. “I love you.” They come free again, finding their home with ease. Blake smiles against the words and that’s when Yang knows that finally— _finally_ —they have found where they belong, they have come to rest as they should, all of her can stop seeking for a home and settle right here underneath this speckled starry sky on top of the uneven, shifting ground beneath her. “I love you.”

 

There’s no more holding it back, no more fighting the inevitable. Destiny wraps them up there on the beach, the two of them unaware—the way destiny prefers to move. They vanish against each other, within each other. Soulmates, some might say. Soulmates beneath an oak tree, below a meteor shower, the flashing lights of the club, the scathing gaze of someone whose purpose has been reduced to killing them, dominating them. Under the stars, far away and close up, steady as the sea.

 

“Love me,” Blake whispers against Yang. “I love you more than the rest of this world combined,” she confesses, no tears, no tremble of her lips—just an urgent need to impress her love in every way possible. “Love me the same.”

 

“As if you even need to ask.”

 

\--

 

**_27_ **

 

Blake’s job keeps her traveling, keeps her moving from place to place, continent to continent. She’s welcomed back by Vacuo’s hot sun and Mistral’s rising mountains and misty waterfalls. Atlas freezes her to her bones and the City of Vale overwhelms her senses with overflowing traffic and lights and crowds.

 

The traveling becomes as much apart of her life as dinner with her parents and game nights with Sun and Neptune. Somehow it fits within the routines, makes itself at home in her expectations, alters her habits.

 

There’s a bittersweet stinging behind her eyes each time she leaves, each new journey she’s sent on.

 

The trips are short, usually only a few days at a time. She does her best to get a taste of the culture around her everywhere she goes, eat some new food or bring back some unusual gift for Weiss or Ruby.

 

A lot of her trips she doesn’t make alone. They use airline points to buy a second ticket, pay for the rest out of pocket. They stay in everything from hostels to resorts, eat microwaved rice cross-legged on an old quilt and break lobster tails at an oceanside table in Menagerie. Balance, Blake decides, is as much needed as routines, as promises.

 

The world welcomes her in, lets her trek her way across it. She discovers what it’s like to go everywhere but never leave where she’s meant to be. She experiences finding a place for herself all over the globe but always having a place to return, somewhere that she belongs more. There were so many years of running, segments of her life carved as being away, apart, separated. There were far more years remaining to tie herself to where she wants to be, to get to hold herself steady.

 

Yang finds a house at the edge of Patch, away from their parents and closer to the city, but still apart of the island, of where they had grown up for two decades.

 

They paint the whole place in four days, the porch outside covered with roller brushes and paint cans and blue rolls of tape. The kitchen is a light, shining yellow that the sun dances with every morning and kisses goodnight in the evening. Blake asks Tai for Summer’s old recipe book which sits on top of the cabinets that hold plants and mugs, on display to be seen, remembered.

 

A pipe bursts their second week in, water spraying from underneath the bathroom sink at two in the morning. Yang is sputtering against fighting to turn the water off and make it stop. When she resurfaces she’s drenched, hair dripping and big, fat waterdrops collecting on her face and rolling off the end of her nose, dripping from her jawline.

 

Blake laughs so hard her stomach hurts. Yang glares so hard it just makes her laugh harder. She kisses her in the too bright light of the bathroom, her back pressing into the wet countertop as Yang pushes into her. _Their_ countertop in _their_ bathroom with _their_ broken pipe. It’s a tight bond holding her in place.

 

There had been years that Blake had tried everything to sever her ties, to set herself free floating. But she’d always found her way back. There were no ties needed, no necessity in welding her into place. Where she was right now, with a small pond on the bathroom floor and her girlfriend’s mouth set in a pout, it was the only place meant for her, the only piece of the world where the sun shone this bright, where the days outlasted the nights.

 

On their trips, Yang jokes about moving somewhere new, about the potential to live beside tall, cool forests and snow-capped mountains or losing herself in the unrelenting heat of the desert. She’s never serious, but Blake wouldn’t mind if she was. It wasn’t running if they were together. You can’t run away when your home is coming with you.

 

Blake proposes first, forgets the ring at home but does it anyway. Yang had a ring of her own in her pocket, and they laugh while they kiss. When it slips perfectly onto Blake’s finger the laughter fades out, matched with parted lips and warm breath and realization that they have survived; they have ended up exactly where they were always going to. No one was able to steal that from them, no one ever would.

 

The ceremony itself is small. They do it just as spring is coming to a close, when summer is right on its heels. Tai’s flowers are all in full bloom in the backyard. Weiss decorates the place so well it might as well have been a professional venue.

 

Blake has her mom do her hair, pulling half of it up, the rest tumbling against her back in curls that don’t quite want to hold. She walks out first and her dad’s crying before they even reach the walkway. He stands with her, still clutching tight as Yang walks out.

 

It’s a vision Blake had imagined for most of her life. The reality surpasses every fantasy, every envisioning. Yang’s dress falls to her knees, heels on her feet. Her hair falls freely, wild gold just as its always been. There are flowers twisted throughout it, little violets, clusters of baby’s breath, daisies so yellow they manage to make themselves seen. The sun shines off of her skin, almost like it’s coming straight from within her instead of radiating off of her. Yang is the bright sunlight, and Blake only ever wants to be warmed by her.

 

Tai is stoic when he reaches the end, kissing Yang’s cheek before reaching over and giving Blake the same. She sees a poorly masked emotion creeping up, a dampness to his eyes. Ghira hugs Yang before they go, taking their respective seats.

 

It took some convincing, but Ironwood is who stands between them today, papers in hand as he reads out the script.

 

Yang passes her flowers to Ruby and Blake to Weiss; the declared “best man.” They had created their bouquets separately, but Blake almost laughs now seeing how similar they are and, despite her best efforts, she can’t help but think of faded, dirty friendship bracelets, of poking strings and uneven endings, of “a little bit of me and a little bit of you.”

 

They share a smile, and Blake could so easily skip the ceremony, go straight to “you may now kiss the bride.” There’s laughter bubbling inside of her, pure joy exuding its way to the surface, tears that have already started but that want to come faster, heavier. Tears of happiness that they’ve made it, sadness for the things they’ve lost along the way.

 

Blake reaches for Yang’s right hand, holds it as Ironwood talks, twists their fingers together as they recite their vows. Traditional, they’d decided, only the slightest alteration.

 

“Do you, Yang Xiao Long, take Blake Belladonna to be your lawfully wedded wife from this day forward?”

 

“I do,” she answers with surety, with a tone colored in _of course_ , with a hint of _finally._ “I promise.”

 

And now Blake’s laughing because if she doesn’t laugh she’ll cry harder and ruin the makeup Ilia had worked so hard on. Her hand is shaking as Yang goes to slide her ring on and she reaches out, holds it steady, cements Blake back down as she slips it on.

 

“And do you, Blake Belladonna, take Yang Xiao Long to be your lawfully wedded wife from this day forward?”

 

There’s something to be said about fighting to get yourself to where you need to be. They had fought so hard for too long. It shouldn’t have been this way. They had known exactly where they were meant to be since that first day. But they were here now. They stood on the other side, and their fight had not made them lesser, had not taken what matters most from them.

 

“I do.” No more running. No more hiding. “I promise.”

 

They kiss with a cheering crowd in the background and Blake’s hands cup Yang’s face; she kisses her gently, purposefully. It’s the sort of forever Blake was never quite sure existed, but it has been carried in Yang’s hands this whole time. It has always lived between her lips, always beat steadily within her chest. Blake takes the promise that she’s felt since she was seven and she accepts it for what it means, what it is worth. It’s lost limbs, lost safety, lost futures. It’s _you’re still forgiven,_ and _I’m still here._ It is sleepovers pressed side by side on a Saturday night, the salt on their skin as the waves rise in and out, as the moon shines above. It’s calling it like you see it, like _destiny, huh?_ Leaky pipes and burnt food and planes that always touch back down from where they had left before, a home that is waiting, that follows her around, that lives in the scent of citrus and campfires, breathes beside her, moves with her.

 

They kiss, and it is forever. Nothing was going to change that, no one held that power anymore, no one but them. And they chose each other.

 

When they pull apart, Yang is smiling wide, her eyes are wet, shining. “I love you, Blake,” she says just low enough that only Blake can hear. It has always been true, has never stopped being as much a part of Yang as her heart or her head or the fire in her veins; it has circulated through her since those days on the playground, tucked beside each other in bed, maybe it’d been born in her from the start.

 

“I love you, Yang.” And the words sound like a memory, like a promise, like their entire future.

 

It doesn’t seem right that they get this much, that they have each other, that each other is everything. There was a lot lost, years stolen, pieces of themselves taken away.

 

But now they had the rest of their lives. They get to claim every ounce back; they get to take so much more. It’s the best promise Blake has ever realized. It’s the one she’s most excited she gets to keep.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's over??? I'm not sure how we got here, but we did. Thank you thank you thank you to everyone who read through this story and commented and kudos-ed along the way. I hope the journey was worth it and the angst balanced out. Ending's are my weakness, and I re-wrote this one four times so I hope it's not horrible/painfully sappy? 
> 
> I'm sad to see this officially end but proud of it. Thank you for sticking with it!! Happily ever after dammit.


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